Amy Franklin-Bihary

Listening is such an undersung skill in the legal profession. Ditto helping the client not feel like an idiot. Amy has both skills in spades. They're a nice complement to her legal acumen. When I work with Amy, she patiently walks me through my options in language I understand. And I alwa...ys feel she's acting in my best interest.

My experience with Amy Franklin-Bihary was less than disappointing. The case of my divorce was complicated and unfortunately it thoroughly confused her. While I could blame some of the results on the complexity of the case, I cannot help to feel that more vigorous approach, especially for trial prepa...ration, could've put me in a better position. Without going into too much details, I could quantify her work as the following: * She is effective when it comes to filing forms, that is, she pays great attention to them. * She is not effective when it comes to trials, as, unfortunately, Amy is not a fighter (at least she didn't fight for me, despite the fact that I paid over $30k in fees for her services). * She is easily flustered and confused by dishonest opposing attorneys, the ones who don't act in good faith and pull "dirty" tricks. The opposing counsel pulled all sorts of tricks on her, and most of the time I was the one who had to explain to her why is that attorney doing what she's doing. It was really baffling, unless one suspects malice, which I don't. * She readily judges what's "fair" and what isn't, and even if something doesn't constitute an illegal action, she still declines to do it if it's somehow "unfair" (in my case she declined to mention any of the dishonest things that my ex did, while the other attorney didn't have such reservations, and it resulted in a very unfavorable picture of me; she also never objected to anything other attorney have said, and the judge herself had to tell the other attorney to stop doing it, once again, baffling). * She had hard times predicting outcomes. For instance, she submitted a paper in front of the judge that laid out grounds for contempt unless I followed every demand my ex asked for. And she knew full well, that my ex is not a reasonable person, because it was after the trial that went awfully wrong for me (where AFB was representing me). When I asked why did she do it, she had no good response. * She didn't do a good job at preparation. Our face to face preparation lasted for 30 minutes, on the morning of first day of the trial that lasted for 3 days. That's right, 30 minutes for 3 days trial, you read it right. During which I asked her how should I answer a very specific question (in terms of general response), hoping for guidance of some sort. She just shrugged and didn't say a word. That very question turned the entire trial from being in my favor to another direction when I answered unprepared. Isn't this why we hire attorneys? To help us prepare? * (OPINION) She isn't as compassionate towards men, as she is compassionate towards women. Her last advice to me was "well, if you sit in jail for a while, maybe it will convince the judge that you have no money". Yep, my own attorney "advised" me to sit in jail for a while, to convince judge I've ran out of money. Another example of why I think she wasn't really into representing me properly, was that she always advised me to "just answer honestly". After the trial, when I told me that my ex lied multiple times and perhaps we could let the judge know at least, her response was "Family court judges aren't particularly interested in prosecuting purgery". If that isn't a glowing example of reverse double standards I don't know what is (my client must say everything honestly, but the other person can lie, and oh well, it's on their conscience). Do you really want an "attorney" like that "representing" you? My unsolicited advice to you, if you are a man, would be, do not hire Amy Franklin-Bihary, or you might be left wondering when it went so wrong, after all is said and done. Find an attorney that represents men, as in Washington state the family court system is strongly skewed towards giving the women all they ask, to the level of your own attorneys not fighting for you, because they don't want to damage their reputation if they come off too strongly in favor of their own client, a man.