Rockefeller Law Center

Jim Rockefeller is a greedy bully who will insist on pursuing unnecessary legal action to squeeze as much money as he can out of you, demand that you do things to drive up his billable hours while refusing to explain the reasons for them, frequently threaten to drop you as a client if you don't respond fast enough for him (and bill you $125 per threat), and if he does drop you he will do it in a way that blindsides you and leaves you no recourse to argue the matter. If you're a woman, he will belittle your intelligence and hammer you with insults until you are left crying. He may be an asshole to the other party, but he's going to be a much, much bigger asshole to you.

He drove my wife and I's bill to $7,676.60 for a Contempt action against my wife's ex-husband who was refusing to return her son from visitation (around $1,500, one court appearance), and a Modification of Visitation action (around $6,100, one court appearance without him as our attorney). His rate is $250 an hour. He was our attorney from January 2018 to March 2019.

He was always rude to my wife during teleconferences and drove her to the point of tears every single time, without exception. From the very first consultation meeting she left the office crying, and we were told by the woman at the front desk that that is common. Should have known then, but we wanted someone who would fight hard in the court for us, so we decided to try and bear with his attitude and insults towards my wife.

He ignored our emails and questions about our case, and when he did reply he randomly chose only one question to answer in a short, unsatisfactory and useless way. But while he was difficult to get a response from, he routinely threatened to drop us as a client for not responding to him quickly enough and billed us $125 each time for the 30 minutes he claimed it took him to write these generic letters.

At one point he demanded we submit proof of income and child support worksheets to his office, even though we weren't pursing any change in child support, only visitation. When we asked why these were necessary, and expressly stated to him that we did not want to have him do unnecessary work that would be billed to us (because we were getting suspicious), he was extremely rude, threatened to drop us as clients repeatedly, and told us to do it because he said so and offered no other explanations.

He is also a liar. He demanded those same documents of the opposing counsel, telling them that WE were the ones who wanted to see if we should modify child support. When we finally caved and sent him the documents under threats of him withdrawing as our counsel, he told us that there was very little difference in child support and that it would not be worth pursuing. He then tells the opposing counsel that WE were the one who were not choosing to pursue modifying child support. Those were our wishes from the very beginning and he ignored them and bullied us into getting what he wanted.

When he finally did withdraw as our attorney, he did not send an email, or call, or make any of his usual relentless attempts to reach us, stating his intention to withdraw. Instead, he sent a letter TO OUR PREVIOUS ADDRESS so that we wouldn't get it or have any knowledge of it. By law we are allowed 10 days to contest his motion to withdraw, but because he intentionally sent the letter to the wrong address and didn't bother to call or email, we missed that window. 3 weeks later he sent us a copy of his motion to withdraw, the granted order on the motion from the judge, and the bill, effectively getting away with over $7,500 for a job he didn't finish.

He is the blackest chapter of my life. We are now in debt and still struggling with the ex-husband on these same issues because there was so much miscommunication and lack of progress. Don't trust this gree...