Aaron Michael Halegua

I hired Aaron — on a contingency basis — to represent me in a wrongful termination and breach of contract case. At first I was impressed with the polished image he presented, and I ended up choosing him over another law firm that also wanted my case. This turned out to be a big mistake, as I later di...scovered. After nearly a year of working on my case, his associate, who was doing most of the legwork, suddenly quit the firm, but he failed to inform me of the change. I only found out several weeks later from an automated bounce-back email, when I attempted to reach him and the associate after having not heard from either in a while. After the associate left, it was clear that my case was getting significantly less attention — Aaron would be slow to respond or in certain cases ignore my emails entirely. A few months later we had a settlement conference scheduled with my ex-employer and a mediating judge. At this point, I had never met Aaron in person, nor had he ever taken the initiative to meet with me. I told him I wanted to meet the day before the settlement conference so we could prep, and he agreed, but canceled last minute, claiming he had Covid. I expressed concerns about not being physically next to my attorneys during the settlement conference, and he assured me that the other attorney on the case would at least be there. But he also ended up not being able to attend in person, claiming that he too had Covid. Aaron insisted that everything would be ok, but something didn't feel right. So, against my wishes, we ended up attending the conference remotely from our respective homes, with both my attorneys sick, and me unable to easily communicate with them during the proceedings. This naturally impacted the outcome. For some reason, even though Aaron had demanded an amount X in the settlement letter just prior to the conference, he and my other attorney started negotiations at a third of X! The strategy was senseless, my concerns about my attorneys not meeting with me before the conference to prep and discuss strategy were clearly justified, and ultimately I was pressured to accept an amount even lower than that, which under the circumstances was an insult: my ex-employer had gotten me terribly sick and then fired me, causing me immense physical, emotional, and financial distress. When I expressed disappointment at the low settlement amount, Aaron replied "At least you look good in a suit!", as if to suggest that looking good in a suit was a consolation prize or something — totally inconsiderate of my losses. (I was wearing a suit for the conference even though it was remote.) But then it got even worse. A little while later he suggested that I could start an OnlyFans for extra cash — absolutely inappropriate! And to give you an even better sense of how Aaron views people... when I asked him if he uses AI in his workflow, he replied "not as much as I should! AI doesn't get sick or ask for time off the way <associate> would" — referring to his associate who had previously worked on my case and left the firm. For an *employment lawyer* to harbor this attitude toward *workers* is shocking, to say the least. After the crude remarks, and the callous way he speaks about his own employees, it's clear to me that Aaron isn't someone you can trust to act in your best interest.