Can I sue my Attorney for Damages to his incompetence?

Question

I was charged with Domestic Violence & Assault by the State of Ohio in 2001. Facts of the case: The mother of my child was living with me at the time of the incident, she was drunk and not caring for our child while I was working, we had an argument and I threatened to leave with our daughter, after the assualt I did. However the assualt was by her, she got in my face (drunk) and tried to headbutt me and the bill of my cap put a mark on her nose. I left, when I returned I was arrested for domestic violence. I hired a local attorney that drug the case on for several months wanting numerous plea bargains in which I was in no way going to do knowing the consequences to the record I would have with the NEW law. He finally came to me with papers to sign and court costs that supposedly depicts that the case will no longer be pursued and no charges were given to me at the time. Several years later in 2007 I was layed off due to a plant closing. I was not getting many calls or returned calls and wondered what was going on and mostly blamed our sorry economy. I had a job offer here lately that was pending a backround check, come to find out I was turned down due to the above mentioned that in the 1st place I WAS NOT guilty of. Now that time has passes and I am not on good terms with this attorney due to milking me for more fees after the case that I did not pay because it was not as discussed and I was unhappy with how long this case took to get over with and could not sue for pain and suffering this law put me through. I am still with the gal who caused this in the 1st place and have since married to make things right. I guess my question is... Would I have a case against this attorney if he did not get me exactly what I paid for "no record" since I was willing to take this to trial to prove my case that she was intoxicated ( I was not) when she made her case that she was assualted out of desperation of losing her daugter as she did her 3 sons prior to our situation for basically the same reason, alcohol. I am about to lose my home due to not getting back to my career as a production supervisor, can I sue him since he did not get what I wanted knowing everything here? Please help!, I feel like I am being turned into a 2nd class citizen and have to rights?

Answer 1

you are caught up in a catch 22 situation.   you can sue anyone but in your case you would have to hire and attorney and that will be your downfall.   no attorney wants a case that would go against a fellow attorney.   you may be innocent but in todays age the courts are being programed to s***w the husband, dad or boyfriend in cases like yours.  the courts advise women that all they have to do is say you molested or harmed a child and you are automatically guilty and the woman doesn't have to prover her charge.   i fell sorry for you.   i went through the court system in ohio in the 80's and 90's over child visitation and althought most lawyers said i was right i couldn't win in a court of law.   i wish you well     mr doodles

Answer 2

If you  signed papers and agreed to pay court costs, you probably entered a plea of guilty.  You can go back to the court and read the papers you signed, they should be in the file.  If you were convicted you should have read the papers before you signed.

But from your question I can see that you don't read very well.  

It is not likely that you can sue the attorney, unless you can prove you were misled by him.  The court will have asked if you understood everything you signed, and you will have had to answer aloud that you did, so now you can't prove you didn't understand.

Don't hit your wife and you won't have this problem in the future.

If you did not plead guilty, and the case was truly dismissed, then you probably need to go the extra step and have it removed from your record.  It is possible that a potential employer saw that there was a charge filed and decided to hire someone who had no prior charges, either dismissed or not.  It is the decision that they made.  It would have had nothing to do with anything the lawyer did to you.  

It is not the lawyer's fault you have an arrest on your record.  That is why they call it a record.  It will have every arrest, whether a conviction or not, unless you pay the fees and have it removed (expunged).

It is also not the attorney's fault the case took a long time to be resolved.  The attorney for the state is the one in control of how long it takes, and whether or not to schedule it for trial.  You should have paid your attorney as you agreed to pay him in the first place.  

Good Luck