Amanda Summer Husted

I retained Amanda Husted’s services in 2019 for a custody/domestic partnership dissolution case that involved a tremendous amount of complexity and conflict. Amanda took an honest and focused approach to my case and was able to reduce the level of conflict and anxiety immediately. I never questione...d Amanda’s advocacy for my daughter or the preservation of our relationship, nor did I ever see anything that would indicate she was driven primarily by financial gain versus doing what was in our best interest. Although Amanda did have a very busy calendar, she was always available for consultation during key decision points and critical phases of the case (such as plan negotiations and trial prep). I could not have been happier with Amanda’s services and still consult with her prior to moving forward with any decisions that could have future implications.

I consulted and retained this lawyer for a family law custody case on a personal referral from another lawyer. Exactly like others have said, in spite of what we discussed, she wrote up something completely different that turned over everything important to an ex who was behaving terribly. Contact ...throughout the process was lacking. I was instead called back days later by a secretary to schedule a phone conversation. This wasn't my expectation of a good legal relationship. She engaged in power plays about having any contact, which I found unprofessional. In times of emergency, she was unavailable. Unable to even get initial paperwork that was appropriate, I cut my losses before filing. I was very concerned that the exact same behaviors ("We don't need to ask for custody!") and dismissive attitude others have expressed would lead to some of the outcomes of their cases. Thank you so much for these reviews. I feel like the patterns of taking advantage of clients remains.

This attorney seems a nice and warm person at first. The strength I found in her practice was her good analytical skills when filing documents (I was the defendant in a divorce with child custody+support/spousal support). There were some omissions and errors that could easily be corrected if she had ...given me enough time to read through before signing them. Very poor time management practice with her clients. She is always in a rush and most court documents that I had to sign and submit were done for example around 9:00am when we needed to be in court for an audience at 10 am, giving me no other option than to sign the document. At times, I would receive some notices from the court that I was late in filing some documents and we would have to find a way to take care of it. Also, she never gave me advice on my rights, duties or even the case. Not being an American citizen, I was pretty much ignorant about the whole judicial system in the US and looking back two years after she defended me, I realize that she mainly took advantage of my naivety and ignorance to make me accept anything she wanted. She convinced me to go for a settlement in which I did not receive anything I asked for. First, she asked me to give up on the custody of our children, telling me that “custody is an empty crown” (Her words that I haven’t forgotten). Also, she allowed my parenting days to be reduced to 5 days a week (before the divorce, the other parent and myself had children one week on/one week off for a whole year and I wanted to maintain this routine whereas the other parent wanted more days for obvious financial reasons). The other parent and myself were both graduate students at the UO and I had debts on credit cards and required this common past debt to be shared equally. She did not address this and the divorce papers are strangely silent on this issue. Instead, she made me agree (on the court) to pay spousal support $1/month for 2 years and then a substantial amount after 2 years (for 3 years). I also discovered few days before the final judgment trial that the court had ordered me to pay the other parent’s health insurance. My attorney NEVER told me this and NEVER showed me any document. I confronted her and she said she did. I kept quiet for how would you argue with your attorney? Did she have another agenda? Hard not to believe so. During the settlement day, she told me the judge asked that I pay the past 8 months of the other spouse health coverage. As a GTF at the UO, adding a spouse to my coverage was $250 for three months. Amanda had all documentation. Normally, I should have paid less than $750 for the 8 months. However, when Ms Amanda wrote the final court order, she wrote $2000 for health insurance for 8 months. I would contact her and she would never reply to me. In court, I understood and told Ms Amanda that she was in no way defending me and I wanted to stop that “settlement” and go for a trial. She didn’t tell me I had any other option. Instead, she kept on putting me more pressure and scaring me with words such as: “You don’t want to go for a trial. They gonna throw mud at you, tell dirty things about you". The next attorney I saw and who read my divorce papers was just astonished at what she was reading and asked me why I accepted all that. I told her it is because I did not know I had a choice to say No. At the end of the settlement "trial", the last words she told me were: "Now, I understand this whole case was about money. She needed money". Strange confession for an attorney. But not too strange: Amanda is that type of attorney who thinks that her client is always telling lies while the other is always telling the truth. So, I had to continuously spend incredible energy trying to prove to my attorney that I was trustworthy.

I hired Ms. Husted for a reasonably straight forward custody and parenting time issue. She was happy to take my money and tell me everything that I wanted to hear but did not follow through with what we had agreed upon. She is extremely hard to get a hold of and I mostly received replies from her sec...retary even-though I would repeatedly ask for her to contact me. She wrote up a final court order that in no way was what was actually agreed upon and then signed off on it as if I had reviewed it and approved the changes. She made substantial mistakes and then refused to correct her mistakes. She ignored my concerns and objections to the final documents. She took over three months to write up a final court order that was supposed to take two weeks. She did not represent me in a way that any intelligent human would find acceptable. I am in the process of filing a complaint with the Oregon State Bar because of her negligence and misconduct. I will never consult her for any legal advice or for representation in the future. I am appalled!!!