This review is for Marc Breakstone. I waited 2 years to post this review out of fear of retaliation. However, the truth needs to be spoken. I would unfortunately not recommend Marc to anyone due to the treatment I experienced by him as my lawyer....
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This review is for Marc Breakstone. I waited 2 years to post this review out of fear of retaliation. However, the truth needs to be spoken. I would unfortunately not recommend Marc to anyone due to the treatment I experienced by him as my lawyer. This is due to the following:
1. Marc took advantage of my helplessness/naivety as a newly injured and desperate victim by charging me a 50% lawyer's fee. The normal fee is 33%. Only after over 3 years of working together and being warned by many people about this fee being overpriced (even for the most difficult of cases), and only after repeated badgering on my part for those 3 years, did he lower the fee to 40% (still high). Accepting this fee was my own fault. But taking advantage of me was a choice he made himself.
2. I was not in control of my lawyer, he was in control of me. When I first hired Marc, he said to me verbatim, “I’ll be your lawyer, but you have to do everything I say. If I say jump, you say how high. Don’t ask questions, don’t talk back, etc.”
Being unfamiliar with lawyers, and desperate for help, I thought this was normal, and agreed. I did not realize that lawyers are supposed to work for their clients, not the other way around. Due to this, he had me doing work he should have been doing himself or asking his secretary to do, like lightening images, reaching out to office case managers, etc. All of this as a disabled young woman trying to recover from a traumatic brain injury.
He would sometimes ignore my emails or requests for information, shutting me down and ignoring what I saw to be crucial details of the case despite my objections, and refusing to communicate about them.
3. During the 4 total years we worked together, Marc regularly threatened me, cursed at me over the phone (including the F word, REGULARLY), and interrupted me when I spoke. For the most part, I feared receiving his phone calls, and finally after 3 years, I insisted that there be a few weeks where he only emailed me, so that our communications would be documented.
At times he refused to let me see parts of my case file, like the defense's IME report. I had to look up public court records online for litigation deadlines due to his refusal to share these things. After 3 years I confronted him about all these things and to his credit, he backed off somewhat. However, he threatened to quit 2 weeks before my arbitration, making me feel cornered into doing what he wanted.
4. He did not know the details of my case as well as he should have. I had to correct him several times when he mixed up crucial details of my case with others, such as another girl with a history of migraines. If I had mistakenly been ascribed with a history of migraines, it could have derailed my entire TBI case. For the most part, I did not feel I was represented to the extent I could and should have been.
All that to say, this was my experience working with Marc Breakstone. I have wondered many times whether I should report him to the Bar for the things I experienced. However, at this time, I am choosing to post this review in order to make the truth known and help me in my healing process as I move forward. Despite the things that occurred, I do choose to forgive Marc, hoping that he will use this review to treat others more respectfully in the future.
EDIT: As I always try to show gratitude, I want to express that I am grateful I was able to have a lawyer advocate for 3 years when many people have no one to represent them. I did express my gratitude to Marc for representing me when we parted ways, as I believe in giving credit where it is due. I could have had no advocate at all. However, I believe that God's protection of me in this case was *despite* the wrongdoing that was done to me by Marc. I am not angry anymore, however, I would not recommend him as an advocate to another client unless there was major change on his part in regard to the things listed above.