Gina Maria Costello

I gave one star rating since there is no zero star. She was my divorce attorney and had the worst experience with her. At the final reading (agreement to) the dissolution in mediation, I started to get very emotional and excused myself to go to the restroom to compose. Right after I entered the ba...throom and was crying, she followed me in and proceeded to raise her voice and told me harshly to get myself together and get back out there so we could wrap it all up. I told her I just needed a few minutes to compose. She continued to hound me to get back to the room in a very rough way. I then told her I wanted my ex to pay for my attorney fees ($6,000) since he had cheated on me for 5 yrs. She said there was NO way they would pay that... NO way! I asked her "how do you know if you don't ask?". She begrudgingly agreed to ask. It was agreed upon that he would pay 1/2. If I hadn't forced her to ask, I wouldn't have gotten ANY fees paid!! I had to argue with her just to get $3,000 for attorney fees! Shouldn't have to do that! In addition to that, she later billed me for phone/email charges in addition to the $3,000 retainer fee I had already paid her for a few short months. I researched the phone logs on Verizon and found that she was over billing me by several hundreds based on her and her paralegal's pay scale for calls/time. I asked her to provide any records of verification of call time she had so I could compare it to mine. She left me a nasty, mean voicemail stating that she didn't operate that way and would NOT provide ANY records. So I ended up sending her a check for the amount that I showed to be correct based on phone records, etc and a note that if she had any issues with the amount that she could contact me. I never heard from her again. In addition to being cheated on by my ex for 5 yrs, this was a horrible experience to go through at a time when you need support, compassion and advocacy. She was rude, brash, and didn't advocate for my best interest financially. For 23 yrs of marriage, I received only 4 yrs of spousal support (and 1/2 attorney fees at MY request). I would not recommend her.

We hired Ms. Costello for our daughter's divorce. She was unprofessional with her writing, grammar and punctuation in her court reports! Really bad. I have to re-do her work multiple time. She must have been working too fast, or dictating without editing. Many of her sentences and paragraphs did...n't make any sense. Her paperwork was never in order during court hearings. The judge commented several time that he couldn't find what she was talking about. The way she wanted us to work with her was quite manipulative to both parties. Sneeky, sly communication with the exiting spouse in order to catch him. Really not my style. She yelled at us a few times when the going got tough and we were frustrated. She even told the judge, in open court, that she smoked marajuana, in an attempt, I think, to minimize the act of using. She also told us that one of her visits was free, then later charged us full price for the same visit. With the multitude of attorneys in Spokane...no one should ever use this person for any legal proceedings. Never.

If I could give no stars I would. I was referred to Gina by another attorney in a child custody matter that unfortunately he was too busy to take my case so he gave me 2 other referrals for attorneys. I was told to call both, talk with them, see how I felt, ask questions and go from there. I called G...ina first. After 7 minutes of being on the phone with me she started to insult me, telling me that she can already tell what kind of person I am and if I’m just going to go back, not to waste her time, that everything trickles downhill and she didn’t want to be bothered. I cried, and told her that I appreciated her brutally honest opinion, but that is why I was reaching out to her for help and representation. I asked her about cost and she said her pricing was cut and dry, $3,500 retainer, $250 an hour which started at the beginning of our conversation that we were already having . I had asked since she’d been doing this so long, and that I knew it might be a hard question to ask, but how much did she anticipate a case like mine costing? Her answer was I’ve had cases go from the $3,500 all the way to $50,000. At this point she said, get me my retainer and then we will talk. She patched me back to her secretary to set up an appointment for the following Monday being that it was the aFriday before. After setting the appointment I had asked the secretary what time they closed that day in the event that I had to call back and possibly cancel and she told me 5. I explained that I was referred Gina and another attorney and it was my right to contact the other attorney as well. Apparently that was too much honestly. Immediately after hanging up the phone I called my mother to discuss getting the $3,500 retainer. While I was on the phone with my Mother, not even 2 minutes after getting off the phone with Gina’s secretary, Gina calls me back herself, says “I’m not gonna get played like that. You want to call me and then shop around for an attorney? I don’t play, gods luck finding an attorney to represent you”. I was speechless, I still had my mother on the other line, and hadn’t even called the other referral yet. I said, “Are you serious right now?”, her response was “absolutely”. I explained I had my mother on the other line discussing her $3,500 retainer. Then she hung up on me. Ultimately I ended up with a better more respectful and respected attorney that didn’t make me cry, is more experienced, less money and not looking to rip me off like Gina would have done. It’s almost a blessing she did what she did because there was a huge possibility that I was going to hire her, and I would have regretted it.