Melbourne Divorce Attorney Hoax

MELBOURNE, Fla. - April 15, 2014 - PRLog -- The process of hiring the right family lawyer is not easy.  First of all, life is continuing to happen and this is really just an extra layer of complexity being added.  Secondly, the emotions and stress that go hand in hand with the dynamics of a splitting family make it ten fold the complexity.

I have 2 children in the teens.  They love both my wife and I very much.  However, my wife and I are not in a position to be able to maintain a healthy relationship.  So, in the process of divorce, I greatly needed a lawyer who was understanding of our situation and willing to go after the things that I feel are most important to address.  No, I am not a lawyer, and I understand that I hired Frank Zilaitis because he is.  However, I am no dummy and believe there are certain things unique to my case that need to be addressed.

Having stated that in my original metting, Frank Zilaitis nodded his head and claimed to understand what my focus was.  This made me feel comfortable and it was easy to proceed into a contract.  Of course, part of me was just relieved to not have to continue a long drawn out search for the right lawyer.

FIRST PIECE OF ADVICE! DO NOT SETTLE for the first lawyer you come across that sounds good.  You should definitely go to 3-5 lawyers no matter what.  Use as much of their time as possible to understand the details and the personalities you are dealing with.

The Pain Begins

So, after paying for the services upfront which included respresenting my best interests through mediation, things got weird.  We disagreed on an approach because he had a "standard" way to proceed.  However, things were not standard in this situation.  We discussed what my end goal was and he came to understand what I wanted.

Fast forward a few weeks and a few heated discussions later.  Frank had moved quickly to get us into mediation and then during mediation, after a misunderstanding, my wife's lawyer responded with a NO to mediation agreement.  At this point, Frank hurried up the process and completed his documents, etc.  The work was now done!!!  The problem is that Frank did not represent my best interests at all.  In fact, the idea that my wife (who is colombian and does not understand english that well) did not understand what offer was on the table and her lawyer let her continue with not agreeing to the mediations, and on top of that, my lawyer (Frank Z) did not try and rectify the situation is proposterous.

Second Piece of Advice

If your lawyer gets an attitude, there's something wrong.  By the time I got to this part of my story, Frank had talked down to me and demeened my character on muptiple occassions.  So, my advice is do not pay a lawyer upfront for any service.  Get an escrow account and sign a contract with specific terms.  The reality is that lawyers are VERY expensive.  The only way to work with this is to hold them accountable for actions.  When someone is billing you 250 - 400 dollars an hour, I think the customer has the right to have some control over how that money is used.

So, What happened?

Today, I am still struggling with my wife on issues about raising our children, healthy communication, constructive criticism, establishing boundaries, not transferring emotions and other types of problems.

I do not have the money to pay for another lawyer to help represent my best interests in court.  I cannot get my money back because the Florida Bar only protects consumers from gross abuse of the system.  Not only that, but the Florida Bar only recommends solutions and does not help ensure a refund.

My children are experiencing pain because of this ongoing struggle.  I am trying to get counseling for everyone.  This is not easy, espeially because my wife chooses not to go.

I am at a loss as to what to do.

What have I learned?

I cannot trust that I can ensure good performance from any legal resource. So, I must do everything in my power to avoid losing money when going through a legal dispute, whether it is family or civil law.  That means:

- I will not pay a lawyer upfront

- I will probably push the buttons of a lawyer to see how they respond BEFORE I am in a contract with them

- I will get advice from at least 3 lawyers before making a decision

- I cannot rely on online reputation, because it is very difficult to find neutral and negative feedback on lawyers online.  (Google "Lawyer Reviews Florida" and you'll see what I mean).