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The Aggressive Family Lawyer – The Lessons I Learned

January 29, 2020     Family Law

Not one day goes by without someone calling YLaw and asking for an aggressive family lawyer. Usually, they ask for me because they think I am one of the most aggressive family lawyers in Vancouver. After all, that is the reputation I established at the beginning of my career.

The need for justice and getting the client everything they asked for landed me in court hearings almost every day, sometimes twice a day. I fought and won over 90% of my family law cases. But in the end, and after practicing for several years, I regret that path. Every win was still a loss to my client and to myself. I will explain.

I have spent the last five years trying to repair my reputation. Because I think a purely aggressive family lawyer who just ups the conflict is one of the worst choices, a family law client can make.

My Experience as an Aggressive Family Law Lawyer

I was reactive to any threats or harm to my client. I needed to protect him/her like I did my family. I thought what I thought was reasonable and should be accepted by the opposing side immediately. If they didn’t accept it, then ‘see you in court.’

My Experience as an Aggressive Family Law Lawyer

This meant that I spent hours, days, and weeks preparing for fights. I had my clients in my office drafting affidavits, gathering evidence against the opposing side, and gearing up for war in court. Sometimes I would interview the teenage children of my clients and write affidavits on their behalf to get custody because I thought that was in their best interests. I fought over every penny that the other side shouldn’t have. My clients loved me because I fought harder than they ever could. Some of those clients are my best friends to this day.

My mistake was following the wishes of my clients when they were caught up in a fight. They wanted an aggressive lawyer, so be it. I was just that. I didn’t realize that part of my job as a lawyer was to lead the client toward healthy goals and tell them about the consequences of a family war. Even if they didn’t want to hear it. If I had given them the wisdom I have today, perhaps they would have changed their approach and (not now but) later thanked me for the advice.

The Loss to My Clients

I didn’t understand how much my clients lost. After all, I was dealing with the breakdown of a family:

  • A couple who at one point loved each other;
  • On one beautiful day, said wedding vows to each other in front of all their loved ones;
  • One day found out they were pregnant and were about to receive the most significant gift life could give them.

That couple was now ending their history. I was involved in encouraging them to become enemies and, in the process, inadvertently hurt their children, their biggest gifts in life.

I was dealing with parents spending their hard-earned money on me at several hundreds of dollars an hour. That money could have been put in an RESP account for their children. I drove my clients to face their husbands and wives in court – in front of a judge and a court reporter. I strategized with them to use their family and friends to testify against one another. I divided not just them but their communities and social circles. The breakdown of a beautiful family had now become a strategic game where ‘losing’ was not an option.

The Results of Being an Aggressive Lawyer

In that process, no matter how much we won, we lost more. After all, most if not all of my clients wanted nothing but:

  • a fair outcome,
  • a relationship with their kids,
  • moving on from a painful breakup and
  • healing.

They were often misguided in thinking that is achieved through an aggressive lawyer. In fact, in most if not all of those cases, the opposite was achieved:

  • children had to pick sides,
  • money had gone down the drain,
  • a painful separation was prolonged, and
  • that couple would never forget that their marriage ended in an all-out, nasty fight in court – an experience which would be communicated and passed down generation after generation.

Do you know how I realized what I was doing was wrong? Those clients who won their ‘battle’ later came to me and said that if they knew better, they would never fight. They would compromise and resolve their issues even if it meant they got less time with their kids or walked away with less money. Because the damage and pain of fighting far superseded the benefits that were gained.

Why You Want an Aggressive Family Lawyer

Many divorcing individuals have never been inside a courtroom before. They have never been as betrayed as they have due to their separation. They have never felt more lost, fearful, sad and vulnerable. Sometimes the false accusations, mistrust, and conflict worsen daily after separation. The divorcing partner feels helpless and faces the profound loss of money, children, support, family, etc.

A survival instinct tells her to fight for her rights, but she doesn’t know how to as she is not a lawyer. Next thing she is involved in the family court system. Now she is up against an intimidating divorce lawyer and feels even more helpless. That’s why the brain first tells her to hire the most aggressive lawyer to protect her, fight for her rights and get her what she needs at separation.

The need for hiring an aggressive family lawyer is because:

  1. You want someone to protect your rights fully; 
  2. You want someone to fight against the other aggressive lawyer representing your ex. 

Your reasons are completely understandable and make total sense. Your choice, however, is not always the right choice.

You do not need an aggressive family lawyer. You need an Assertive Family Lawyer.

Who is an Aggressive Family Lawyer?

An aggressive family lawyer is a lawyer who is so instinctually combative that their overriding urge is to engage in conflict regardless of whether or not it is in the client’s long term best interest. These lawyers generally come in two forms:

  • They genuinely believe that fighting and conflict are the best ways to resolve a dispute, and have no understanding of long term consequences or results.
  • Are ego driven and greedy, and drive the client into fights in order to maximize on monetary gain.

Who is an Assertive Family Lawyer?

An assertive family lawyer is a strategic and intelligent lawyer who always maintains their client’s long term interest as their ultimate goal. They are not push-overs and do not bend under pressure. But they weigh all benefits and costs in any situation in order to use the most effective tools when resolving conflict. Those tools may be negotiation, mediation or litigation. They cater their strategy to the uniqueness of the client’s situation and carve out a unique solution to every problem. They are not afraid to fight, but fight wisely and when it is absolutely necessary.

The Aggressive Family Lawyer vs. The Assertive Family Lawyer

The Aggressive Family Lawyer v. The Assertive Family Lawyer

Conflict vs. Results

The aggressive lawyer looks for conflict. The assertive family lawyer looks for resolution while not being a push over.

Ask yourself this: have you ever witnessed a high conflict situation having a constructive result? Take it from wars, to people assaulting each other, to bullying at schools, to people bashing each other online? Do you think hightening the fight in your case would be any different? Then why do you want a lawyer to up the fight? What you need in your family law case is a fair result, not war. 

Winning vs. Resolution

The aggressive lawyer is one-dimensional and has one method that he follows: fight in court. The assertive lawyers looks at all options, applies logic and a cost/benefit analysis to them, and then collaborates with you to find the best option.

Ego vs. Wisdom

The aggressive family lawyer is often ego driven because the ego wants to be validated and win. The assertive family lawyer does not let his/her ego get in the way of properly protecting his/her clients while at the same time seeing whether compromise will achieve more than a fight would.

Short term vs. Long term

The Aggressive family lawyer focuses on short term results. The assertive family lawyer focuses on long term results.

In many of my cases when I used to be aggressive, the client loved having me fight for them and having their voices heard. They loved the ‘wins’. But after several months or years, they realized that those ‘wins’ were not really wins. They achieved nothing but some temporary pleasure of ‘putting the other side in their place’. Long term, however, those ‘wins’ further damaged relationships, finances, etc.

But What if the Opposing Lawyer is Aggressive?

Many clients think that because the other side has an aggressive lawyer, they also need one to match the game. However, based on my experience, an assertive lawyer is much more effective in facing an aggressive lawyer in the following ways:

  • The assertive lawyer is much more respected by judges and in court than the aggressive lawyer. Judges want to arrive at a fair result. Whoever seems them eye-to-eye and suggests realistic and fair solutions will come out successful. Most judges do not appreciate aggressive and unreasonable lawyers.
  • The assertive lawyer is mentally healthy, focused and level headed. He/she is not reactive. The aggressive lawyer often has a temper and is reactive. In a family law case, reactiveness when unnecessary can cost fortunes.
  • The assertive lawyer doesn’t let ego get in his way, so he will exhaust all opportunities to communicate and lead the case towards settlement rather than conflict. That lawyer can actually manage and lead the aggressive lawyer onto a positive path of conflict resolution;
  • The assertive lawyer will fight long and hard if he/she realizes that negotiation or reason does not work with the other side, but before that, he/she will exhaust all opportunities to save you time and costs of fighting if other options are available.

Conclusion

Do not put your eggs in the aggressive lawyer basket. You will have much more to lose than gain, and you will almost always regret your choice. Hire an assertive lawyer.

To find the best family lawyers in Vancouver, check this page.

Leena Yousefi is an assertive (no longer aggressive!) family lawyer and the founder of YLaw Group. She ensures that all lawyers at YLaw are assertive and not aggressive. After all, the client’s best interests are of the highest value and importance at YLaw, and should be that way with every lawyer and law firm out there. 

 

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