Feibleman Case Attorneys at Law - Family Law, Divorce, Estate Planning, Personal Injury, Alternative Dispute Resolution attorneys / lawyers in Oregon

About our Practice:

Feibleman & Case P.C. practices throughout the State of Oregon. Over 75% of our cases are in the following Oregon counties: Marion, Polk, Linn, Clackamas, Benton & Coos. Other Oregon counties in which we have appeared are: Multnomah, Washington, Yamhill, Lincoln, Tillamook, Clatsop, Columbia, Lane, Douglas, Josephine, Jackson, Klamath & Deschutes.

Feibleman & Case P.C. handles:

Original Divorce Proceedings
Post-divorce Judgment Enforcement Proceedings
Child Custody Cases
Modifications
Premarital Agreements
Parentage (paternity) Proceedings
Appeals of Family Law Cases

In some firms the lawyer with whom you interview will not actually work on your file. In our office, each case is assigned two lawyers and one legal assistant. This assures that there will always be someone in the office who can answer your questions and more than one lawyer will be capable of handling any contested matters in court. The lawyers of Feibleman & Case P.C. are experienced in negotiating and in trying all family law cases.

Feibleman & Case P.C. is state of the art. This involves both investments in technology which increase efficiency as well as investments in remaining at the cutting edge of family law issues. An example of that efficiency is the Feibleman & Case “Short Sheets on Family Law” which have been an aid to courts throughout the state since 1994. This database was developed over the years by Gilbert B. Feibleman.

Clients of Feibleman & Case P.C. may communicate with the law firm via fax transmission. If secure protocols are established, clients may also communicate with the law firm via E-mail.

Family law proceedings involve one of the most difficult periods in a person's life. Studies indicate that three of the most stressful events are divorce, moving and death of a close family member. Divorce often involves at least two of these significant events. Post-divorce proceedings can be equally traumatic. They may involve proceedings for modification of custody which is one of the most difficult areas of a family lawyer's practice.

It has been said that family lawyers see good people at their worst. For this reason a lawyer handling a family law practice must have the ability to listen well, to communicate promptly and to commit himself to providing quality legal services. This is the goal of Feibleman & Case P.C.

We treat our clients with respect and integrity and expect the courts and the opposing parties to do likewise. We are proud of the fact that when a case is over, our clients feel stronger, more self-confident and that we have helped close a painful chapter in their life. We stand for the proposition that we are devoted to the best interests of children which means we seek the least adversarial way of resolving family conflict. Our lawyers are known for their ability to be creative problem solvers not just cogs in an adversarial system. Integrity and respect for our clients defines our mission…A Fair Result achieved through the highest level of skill and ethics defines our goal.

We find that we can better serve our clients if we tell them what they can expect from their law firm. In return, we like to inform them of our office operating procedures. In this way a client can save money and time, as well as obtain maximum results from our office.

Your file is always open to you. The documents and folders which we keep are the property of our clients, held by us in trust for them. With reasonable advance notice, we can make available to you copies of any document in your file. We do ask that you let us know in advance if you wish to stop by and pick up copies of papers. If you will give us a telephone call, we will do the copying and mail the papers to you.

It is important to keep our files current. Accurate information is essential if we need to contact you at home or at work. Please be sure to let us know if there is a change in your telephone number, place of work or home address.

Unless a flat fee is arranged, our firm bills on an hourly basis for the time spent on your case. Records are kept by each attorney for each tenth of an hour. Thus, a one-half hour interview will be listed as: "Office visit with client - .5". We usually send our clients an itemized billing at least once a month.

It is customary to arrange payment for the services of an attorney when the case is started. This is done by paying an initial deposit to our firm's trust account. When we receive your deposit to the trust account, we start working on your case.

Sometimes our attorneys will be very busy and unable to answer your telephone call immediately. If an attorney is not available, we specifically ask that you talk with one of our support staff and leave a message for the attorney as to what information you are requesting or what your question is.

Our office support personnel are listed elsewhere in this web site. We ask that you talk with one of them to see if they can help you. While they cannot provide the legal advice that an attorney would, they can be very helpful in resolving routine inquiries that you may have.

We try to provide our clients with copies of all letters and pleadings which we prepare or receive. Feel free to ask for any document which may be involved in your case.

If we take your case, we will require certain things of you. First and foremost is a list of your goals and priorities. This will help us to organize our work to attain those goals for you.

Next we may require a "diary" or notebook from you telling us what facts we need to know. This will, of course, vary with the type of case. In a custody case, for example, you should tell us at least the following:

Who has had primary responsibility for the child before the separation;
Who has had primary responsibility for the child since the separation;
Information that might be used against you or the other parent at trial;
Employment and income of the mother and father;
Reasons why you should have custody;
Reasons why the other party shouldn't have custody; and
Witnesses you wish to call, including names, addresses, work and home telephone numbers, and a summary of what each should say.

We would request other kinds of information, for example, in a child support or alimony case. It is a more effective use of attorney time if you write these matters down at the earliest possible stage and go over them with us. We want to work together with our clients as a team.

No attorney can guarantee success in a particular case. It is our word and our promise to each individual client that we will work hard to attain the goals that the client has set for us. We will do no less for each client.

The client is, in a very real sense, the boss in the law office. It is the client who must make the major decisions in his or her case. This is for two reasons.

First, the Rules of Professional Conduct require the lawyer to leave these to the client. The ethical duty of a lawyer is to inform a client of the important issues and consequences and then let the client make the major choices in his or her case. The canons of ethics under which lawyers operate impose this duty on us.

The second reason is that, in reality, it is your case and not the attorney's. It is your obligation to decide these matters which so vitally involve you. The lawyer has no business in telling you, for instance, what is "enough child support" for you to receive or whether you should pay spousal support or not. It is you (in these examples) who would be receiving the child support or paying the spousal support, not the lawyer. While the lawyer's guidance is important, it is you that must make such major decisions as these.

At the same time, there are other matters which must be decided by the lawyer in your case. These are not major policy decisions, but rather tactical decisions that our training in the law helps us make. Issues such as how to question a witness, what approach to use in the argument to the judge or jury, or what motions to present to the court ought to be made by your lawyer. You are free, of course, to ask us about these matters or to give suggestions or offer criticism. In the final analysis, these tactical decisions should be made by the lawyer using his best judgment, just as the major policy decisions ought to be made by you, with the guidance and information provided by us.

One of the most important duties of your lawyer is a frank and honest discussion of the facts and issues involving your case. This duty of openness and honesty to you involves the following items:

Your attorney will advise you about the positive and negative aspects of your case. You need frank and honest information on the difficulties that may be present in your case as well as the advantages that you have. No purpose is served in your lawyer telling you only the "bright side" of things. This will only lead to unmet expectations and dissatisfaction by the client if the outcome is not exactly as he or she wishes. It is our obligation to be candid and honest with you in evaluating all sides of your case.

Although we can provide the client with some comfort through an understanding of the laws pertaining to divorce, support and custody, it is important to remember that the lawyer is a legal counselor. If a client feels the need for non-legal guidance, counseling, therapy or just a shoulder to lean on, he or she should seek that type of help separately. There are many psychologists, psychiatrists and other professionals in this field.
Money and time are important facts for a client to consider. Lawsuits can be complex, time-consuming and quite often very frustrating for all parties, the lawyers or the judge. We believe in discussing with our clients at the initial interview such matters as the hourly rate our firm charges, the amount of the initial fee that you pay to our firm for services to be rendered, the approximate time we expect your case will take, and the possibility of requesting an award of attorney's fees as reimbursement to you. It is our belief that our client will be better informed and more satisfied with our services if we discuss these early and openly.

You should realize, of course, that no case is exactly like another. Cases which appear to be simple often turn out to be very complex. No good lawyer in most cases will tell you that your case is "easy" or "no problem." Many cases which will appear to be routine at first glance can later be found to involve problems in areas such as jurisdiction, default, Fifth Amendment privilege, merger and tax liability, as examples.

Absent a specific agreement otherwise, our clients are entirely responsible for the fee for professional services charged by our firm. After the deposit of funds to the firm's trust account, it is customary to bill the client at regular intervals to inform him or her of work done in the case and to request, if necessary, additional funds to continue work on the case.

We maintain records of the time we have spent on your case. Our files, including these records, are open to you at any time with reasonable advance notice. A good lawyer should have nothing to hide from a client, and we want our clients to know the time and nature of the work we are doing for them.

Whatever you wish to reveal with your lawyer is forbidden to be repeated or discussed by your lawyer without your permission. What you say in our office to us remains here unless you allow us to discuss these matters with someone. No judge or court can order a lawyer to disclose the confidential matters you bring to your attorney's office (outside of unusual cases such as the intention to commit a crime in the future or to commit perjury on the witness stand).

The purpose for this rule is to ensure that you will be frank and candid in your discussion of facts with us. We need to get the full facts directly from you. A lawyer should not have to wonder if his client is telling the whole truth.

Even if you believe that there is some fact which may be harmful to you, it is better to discuss this openly with the attorney in the first place. It is far better that the attorney be confronted with this fact at an early stage, rather than learn about it for the first time in the courtroom when the other attorney and that lawyer's client have known about it all along. Surprises of this kind can only harm your case.

With advance knowledge of problems or difficulties, the lawyer can often suggest courses of action which can avoid exploitation of the problem by the other side. You can trust us to keep your confidential information to ourselves and not reveal it, without your permission, to people outside our firm.

An attorney has an obligation of loyalty to the client. Especially in domestic cases this is very important for the client to remember.

Some clients believe that the lawyer's friendship or contacts with the attorney on the other side of the case is a sign of disloyalty or inability to represent aggressively the client's position. This is not so. It is the sworn duty of the attorney to represent fully, zealously and competently the lawful needs and legitimate goals of the client.

A good attorney can have no divided loyalty. We cannot and will not settle your case without your permission. When you hire our law firm to represent you, your case demands undivided loyalty.

One of the best summaries of your attorney's duties to you is contained in a "Declaration of Commitment" published by the American Bar Association, which asks that all lawyers live by these principles and provide copies of them to their clients.

***Feibleman and Case P.C. provides the above information as a service to potential and current clients as well as continuing education to other lawyers. A person's accessing the information contained in this web site, is not considered as retaining Feibleman & Case P.C. for any case nor is it considered as providing legal advice. Feibleman and Case P.C. cannot guarantee the outcome of any case.