SORTING THROUGH CONFUSING
AND CONTRADICTORY ADVICE

Welcome to the World Wide Web! And welcome to the confusion that comes with so many sources of information, much of it being overwhelming and contradictory. How do you sort out what is best for you? We hope this page will help you do that.

PROBLEM AREAS

• My present lawyer tells me to wait and see what happens. You say ACT NOW, who is right?
  
  
  

There are times that doing nothing can be the best thing to do! But those times are rare, and it is a high stakes gamble. A gamble with your life, your freedom and your children's lives based on a childlike fantasy that everything will just blow over all by itself. Sometimes it does, but almost always the problem grows larger or returns again in a short while in a much more malevolent form, and you remain disarmed. Eventually that will catch up with you. You can't escape the real boogeyman by pulling the covers over your head.

There is a narrow window of opportunity for you to end the allegations against you before human nature kicks in and powerful people make up their minds and refuse to change them. Once the opportunity to persuade has passed, generally speaking, you will be in a battle for your life. What started as a simple easily disproved false allegation can take on a life of its own, and you could find yourself dealing with what I have coined as the three ring circus. Divorce court, dependency court, and criminal court and in the cases of alleged domestic violence there can be a fourth ring added (domestic violence court). In those added rings your accuser is provided free legal help, you are not. Often you will find you need a different lawyer for each one of those rings. You can become the benefactor of the "Full Employment for Lawyers Act." What was simple is likely to become a desperate battle for your very life and that of your family.

• I have seen other consultants on the web and they claim that they are the best experts and that your approach is too expensive.
  
  
  

Yes, we're aware of that. Some of those "experts" say that you don't need to do "any" of the things we suggest. Some say "never hire a psychologist, psychiatrist or medical doctor as your expert, always use a social worker." Well, that is because they are a social worker. What they mean is, "hire me." At best social workers are half-trained. They use all sorts of buzz words generally to bamboozle potential clients into the belief that they have some knowledge that they don't really possess. Yes, our way, using REAL psychologists, Psychiatrists, and Medical Doctors is more expensive, but it is based on the truth rather than trying to pull a fast one on the courts. It costs more but is less dangerous. If you want danger we suggest you contact Evil Kneivel and take up jumping motorcycles over canyons, it's LESS risky!

• Another consultant says he does the same things you do and that you charge way too much for things that have no proven benefit.
  
  
  

Yes, we're painfully aware of that too. Cutting corners is something that has always been a great come-on to snare people. Lots of folks have looked for ways to make all sorts of products cheaper. There is little difference between those who say "DO NOTHING" and those who say cut out this or that, "You don't need to be prepped" and statements of that kind. First, those who say that it isn't necessary for things like being properly prepped, say so because they don't know how to do it in the first place. Secondly it is the sales pitch to hook you as a client. The problem with this "cheaper" way of doing things is that it NEVER really is! You need to consider the situation you are in as being akin to having a brain tumor. Would you ask your surgeon to start cutting costs? In this case the analogy isn't perfect, largely because it isn't just you who bear the consequences. Your family, and most often your children share the error with you. In one case this "consultant" has had three clients who ended up killing themselves, another who murdered his wife and shot a judge. He has also has several clients coerced into accepting plea bargains for things they never did. We have taken some of those cases, from this "author" and cleared the people's names. Yes, promises to do cases like yours for less are common. But actually doing that isn't. There are times that prepping isn't needed, and in those cases we say so. It is a judgment call and it takes years of experience to tell when it is advisable. Sometimes you can get away with not being prepped. But prep isn't all that it is about, and those who say it isn't needed don't really understand what is needed because they never go to court for trials themselves. Some of the best lawyers won't accept a case where it is done any other way. And you need to know why it can make a big difference to you. You also need to be aware that there is no cookie cutter. All cases are not the same. In many cases we use scientific testing to help establish important facts, but not in all cases. In fact, today, after 2010, we are relying on testing less and less. We have moved to other FACT based approaches. Stuff changes and we with the changes. You need to know as well that the "other side" hasn't stood still either. Most of those tools have been under attack. Not that the attacks have scientific merit, but why waste thousands of dollars fighting something that you don't have to? The A-Team is still well ahead of the game, and those who copy us continue to be angry.

• I have been really impressed by some of the other web sites I have seen and all the expertise offered by consultants who claim to have worked on many "high profile" cases, you don't appear to have done so, why?
  
  
  

We've have seen that too. The simple fact is that the claims are deliberately misleading or utterly false. Those individuals didn't really "consult" on any of those cases, but they want you to think they did so you trust their advice. It is one of the oldest con games in the world. Were they PAID to "consult" on the cases, by whom? Just what did they in consulting on those cases? In one case the "consulting" turns out to be that they hounded reporters until somebody quoted them in a story about the case years after the fact, but they played ABSOLUTELY NO ROLE in the cases anywhere. It is rank self aggrandizement of the worst type and warns you that you are dealing with an individual who is an obsessive self promoter and not somebody interested in YOUR life. You need somebody devoted to you and not themselves.

In a few of those cases we had REAL roles in the cases, minor as they may have been. You don't see them here because we don't need to pat ourselves on the back, we'd rather let our clients do that for us.

Beware a consultant who is into endless self promotion. They are sultans of bamboozlement. If you look you find they have extensive criminal histories that do include convictions. Not to mention betrayal of client confidentiality in order to promote himself. Who is he in business for? You or himself?

• I have noticed that another web site offers almost the same advice as you do and that consultant claims to be better than you, is that true?
  
  
  

I have seen many of the other websites including that one, and many of the so-called "TIPS" are a direct rip-offs of what you see on this website. Things I wrote of 20 years ago. They say that imitation is the highest form of flattery. But those who imitate don't really innovate, and what they copy they do with only surface understanding of the deeper concepts underneath. Often in the business world it is a bit more predatory than mere imitation. What you get is a pale imitation. People can claim anything on the web. It doesn't have to be true. Often it is only partly true or patently false. Your best bet is when there is accountability to a professional organization. With no professional affiliation you are on your own. You have nothing to fall back on. Professional qualifications are essential. Anyone can write a book. If THEY actually wrote it and not a hired ghost writer. Anyone can conceal from others their real background.

A good question for you to ask, if you are in custody related case, one that will prove the most important questions you can ask of someone you may spend lots of money on, is if they were involved in a case like yours, did THEY win custody? If they couldn't win their own custody case or they had someone else win their criminal case, how good could they really be? How can they advise you? In one case the "Consultant" actually was successfully defended by the A-Team, although today he claims that he strategized the case, that claim is a lie proven in his own books. Think about this decision. Your life can depend on it! You should ask the same questions of a "consultant" you would of a lawyer or anyone else. Look at the top 10 questions for hiring a lawyer. Add a few to that. Anyone honest doesn't mind answering your questions. Ask "Have you ever been arrested?" Ask, "Have any of your clients ever killed themselves?" How many times have former clients sued you for fraud? If you get rationalizations or confounding answers run like hell you know there are problems. In more than 35 years of doing these cases, we have never had a client who killed themselves. We have never had an innocent client accept a plea bargain. We will match our track record against anyone's for the rate of acquittals. But nobody comes even close to our record that well over 95% of our cases are dismissed prior to trial if we get in early enough. We are not called the "A-Team" for nothing. There's cheaper but there is not better anywhere!

• I have heard some people say terrible things about you.
  
  
  

Yep, you probably have it's all over the internet. Lots of things exist on the World Wide Web, and none comes with any guarantee of being true. You can't do what we do and have been doing for more than 26 years without having made yourself a target for just about every lunatic and extremist or NUT case in the nation. And the Internet is a great place for the mentally ill to congregate. Even to put up a web site full of forged materials and quotes from fictitious people. If you look hard enough you'll see that that material comes from anonymous sources. Anonymous remailers that permit "spoofing" (making up) sources and materials. We are bothered by it, but until the 1st Amendment is repealed we have to tolerate those falsehoods. There have been websites where deranged individuals announced plans to murder people before they did it. Sadly there are several web hosting companies who support this kind of behavior and nothing can be done about it. It is interesting to note that in one example, the site was thrown off almost two dozen American services before the maniac found a rogue operator off shore who would shield the falsehoods. Congress enacted the Telecommunications Decency Act of 1997 giving unlimited license for libel on the Internet.

The final thought we have is that if you want to believe those terrible things about us that come from fabricated anonymous sources, nothing we can say will change that. You'll be hurting yourself more than us. Why do they do it? In some of these cases it is jealousy, or some other form of mental illness. We've elected to not spend a great deal of time analyzing what we can't change anyway. Not until the law is changed to make the Internet Service Providers accountable for what they put out. Even still if you look hard enough you'll see the main website has been thrown off almost a dozen internet hosts. Are people lying about you? Do they make the lies appear to be true? Give us the same consideration you'd like for yourself.

• The other consultants also say that -they- also testify as experts and that you don't do that.
  
  
  

Yes that's true, we don't testify as experts. And there are lots of reasons you don't want a trial consultant who does. First it mixes and confuses roles. Are they "experts" or are they "advocates" because you can't be both. It is a conflict of interests. You'd better pray that the judge never finds out that your "expert" is also a consultant on your case. Pray that nobody researches your "expert's" background.

As you navigate all the things we've mentioned so far, you see and hear and what appears to be appealing, you can make terrible mistakes if you bet wrong. Taking bad advice that "sounds" good and ignoring advice that is good but "sounds" hard or bad. There are many unethical people on the Internet. They can try to fool you with their written materials, claiming that because they have written things that seem good on paper that they are "authorities." Authors of books, like authors of web pages can say just about anything they want and it doesn't have to be true. While there are "clubs" for authors they have no power to discipline members or enforce any code of ethics on them. And this is extremely important to YOU. It is important because with no ethical responsibility that is enforceable there are many problems you can face. Such as:

1. Having NO guarantee of confidentiality. And no way of enforcing any breach of it. With no professional affiliation, what does he have to lose?

2. With no accountability there is no guarantee that you will get what you are paying for. The "expert" can take your money and run, and there is nothing you could do about it.

3. There are those who solicit being used as "experts" to testify for you. They tell you that they get paid "whether my testimony is allowed or not." Sounds like a good deal. And in most cases that is a fair proposition. But what of when that "expert" has some nasty personal baggage he has to hide? And that baggage is of such a nature as to make his testimony untrustworthy. With professional ethics you as a client have a right to know if such problems exist before you hand out nonrefundable money. But without accountability you don't have it. That is only part of what CERTIFICATION provides to you. Not just an assurance of knowledge and professional behavior, but ethics as well. What happens when this "expert" isn't allowed to testify because he ISN'T an expert? Do you get your money back? Several clients have had to sue for fraud.

4. We, like most professionals, take nonrefundable retainers. However, the promise you get is that if we fail to show up and perform as agreed and it is our fault, 100% of what you have paid is refundable. And we refund unearned portions when trips are cancel at least 4 days in advance. And if you cancel less than 4 days in advance of scheduled trips, we don't provide money refunds, but we will do other work at another time if you choose. The reason that we keep retainers in the event of short notice cancellations is because we lose time that way. Usually we turn down others to guarantee the time for you. So you can trust that we'll really be there and not engage in a bidding war for our services. We keep our commitments.

You need to make sure that the lawyers you hire have proper credentials for your kind of case, that the trial consultant you hire really -is - a trial consultant and not just somebody who thought the title sounded good. Or they self confer titles upon themselves such as "Forensic Litigation Consultants," Trial Strategists, or any of a hundred other contrived self aggrandizing self subscribed titles they made up.

There are those who even claim to have been "part" of the A-Team at one time, or to have referred us cases in the past. Well those people were never really part of the A-Team except in their own minds. They promise to do the same things we do, to use the same experts we do and that - they - are the ones on the cutting edge of knowledge and technology. They aren't even close! They "copy" what they think we are doing. They don't innovate. They don't create new avenues of handling these cases. They copy what they thing we did from 20 years ago. We have been doing this for 35 years and we still are developing new tools, covering new problem areas developing new resources and adapting the best of modern technology. Many of the others think they are "with it" in the use of modern technology because they have a "laptop" and they work with videos. There are laptops and there are laptops. We don't work in video tape any more, most all we do is on Digital Video Disc. We have large amounts of data on compact discs. We can pull from vast libraries of studies from field disks of thousands of documents in Adobe Acrobat and other formats. We can create intricate audiovisual presentations for courtroom purposes.

We do jury selections and jury psychology for jury trials. We do case trial strategy through the trials. And have participated in thousands of trials in ALL 50 states and 9 foreign nations. We say this not to engage in self aggrandizement, but to illustrate for you that actual trial experience and membership in the appropriate professional organization with credentials is critical for your consideration. Anything else is buying a "pig in a poke." And we think you deserve better. In cases like yours, you need to be as sure as you can be. There is no eraser on this kind of pencil. You don't get to take the test over. Do it right the first time or live with a lifetime of regret that you bought a fast line. It takes more than selling some books, caps, coffee mugs, T-shirts and the like. Please take heed. Look for the label. Look for assurance that you aren't getting hoodwinked. Beware grandiose promises. And feel free to ask for references to lawyers and others who we've worked with. A very telling thing is when those relationships have only been very short as opposed to, say, relationships that have lasted almost two decades or even three decades. When you are only the second or third client referred to the "team" lawyer, ask yourself why the relationship is so new. How many cases has he done with other lawyers? Get the names and phone numbers and check them out. We can refer you to lawyers we have worked with on thousands of cases with and others hundreds of cases in the past 26 years. Long term relationships with the experts they work with is important as well, years, as opposed to months should be what you are looking for.

Lots of the people who want your money have a great many things to hide from you. And they have no problem in concealing their personal history from you, or even lying to you about their checkered history. They don't think you are entitled to know of their problems. They are wrong. Think of the damage to your case if you hire that "expert" and find out while he is on the witness stand that his laundry is actually dirtier than your own? Ask your lawyer what that would do to your case. And in at least one case, the "expert" was adamant that if he got exposed in court and throw off the witness stand that he keeps the money, and he was thrown off. Well, technically he may be right. Ethically and morally, of course, we think he's just plain wrong and you should too! There are precious few things that we or anyone honest can guarantee you in these kinds of cases, but honesty is the main one we CAN and DO offer you. Even when that honesty hurts US. We feel we owe that you our clients. Does he give you a contract to review before you hire him?

We want your business. And we deserve it. You won't find anyone who will work as hard for you as we will. We bring the very best to your case. Yes, you can find many people who say they will do things cheaper for you. The reality is that it almost never really works out that way. Most often you'll find they have made a mess of your life and bankrupted you and they have no remorse at all, they suffer a sense of entitlement. They will blame you and everyone else but themselves. Of course, by then, it's too late. Please don't find out the hard way!

If you want to believe the nasty things you read on the internet, you need to know you can't believe it only applies to the founder of the A-Team but all our lawyers and experts as well. This all being said there are some other honest folks out there. The self-promoter just isn't one of them, he spends much of his time degrading all of the others in the field. We manage to work WITH many of them from time to time. They are welcome members of the fraternity. We're not ENTITLED to work for you, it's something we are happy to earn.

Also at this time - in view of the current economy (depression/recession) we are willing to work on substantially reduced rates and even for barter. We can't work for free, but we can try to help reduce the pain.