Hess Kennedy/ConsumerLawCenter/The Attorney Network

can't they report them to the ag in fl

tonythetiger & mike_otr -

Welcome to the forums! There is quite a bit of information about Hess Kennedy on this site - many people have had experience with them and reported it here.

If you wish to see more information on this company, use our Google search on the upper left corner of this page and search on "hess" or "hess kennedy" - you'll be surprised at what you'll find.

I'll tell you for sure they are crooked! I got out while I could and I'll never recommend then to anyone. If you need to use a company like this, do it where you can go into the office in person. Stay away from this com. and don't ever send your money to any place like this. Especially in Fl. That is where all the crooks are any way!

Wow. It's amazing to hear that you have been done wrong by this company. I signed up 3 months ago with The Attorney Network, and I just received a letter from the Consumer Law Center with the settlement amount they reached with my creditors. I went into the program with 12,500 dollars in credit card debt, and they have settled for 3000 dollars!!!

Whenever I had a question, they were always available to answer it for me, and never gave me the "run-around" . It sounds to me like this is a disgruntled former employee.

- Bernard

Here is proof of link between Hess & Campos taken from sunbiz.org.

Florida Limited Liability Company
THE CONSUMER LAW CENTER LC
Filing Information
Document Number L06000115625
FEI Number APPLIED
Date Filed 12/04/2006
State FL
Status ACTIVE
Last Event LC AMENDMENT
Event Date Filed 02/06/2007
Event Effective Date NONE
Principal Address
210 N. UNIVERSITY DRIVE
209
CORAL SPRINGS FL 33071 US
Mailing Address
210 N. UNIVERSITY DRIVE
209
CORAL SPRINGS FL 33071 US
Registered Agent Name & Address
ROBBINS, TIM
210 N. UNIVERSITY DRIVE
209
CORAL SPRINGS FL 33071 US
Name Changed: 04/30/2007
Manager/Member Detail
Name & Address
Title MGR
LAURA HESS, INC.
210 NORTH UNIVERSITY DRIVE
CORAL SPRINGS FL 33071 US
Title MGR
JEFF CAMPOS, P.A.
3200 N. UNIVERSITY DRIVE
CORAL SPRINGS FL 33065 US
Title MGR
DAVID KLEIMAN, P.A.
954 WEST GRACE STREET
CHICAGO IL 60613 US
Title MGR
DAVID LIPMAN, P.A.
3200 N. UNIVERSITY DRIVE
CORAL SPRINGS FL 33065
Title MGR
STEIN, LEE
123 NW 13TH STREET
BOCA RATON FL 33432
Title MGR
MAVRIDES, MOYAL & ASSOCIATES, LLP
1622 YORK AVENUE
NEW YORK NY 10028
Annual Reports
Report Year Filed Date
2007 04/30/2007

People blogs are for people to post whatever they want they hide behind the computer saying negative things for their own interests. Now I ask you this could be 1. Disgruntle Employees 2. Competitors bashing on other companies to sway you their way? 3. Think about it if complaints were real why complain here file the complaints to the Attorneys Generals Office and have that company shutdown! Simple basic, just use common sense! Not everyone is out to get you!

I am neither a client or a competitor of these companies.I am simply providing the facts to our members & guests. If anyone has problems with these companies please file a complaint with the following two agencies.

www.myfloridalegal.com
www.floridabar.org

I thought this people would help but really they made things a lot harder. The number where I was calling them, no one is answering. I'm negative in my bank and have no money for food, gas, and the rest of my utilities. I have made my complaints and hope something is done about this people that are taking hard earn money from hard working people. I suggest that people that have fallen in this trap to use the links that CajunBullDog gave us.

So yeah, they got me..... I sent a cancel letter, and they stopped taking the monthly payments out of my account. BUT what can I do now with my creditors? Do I contact them? The consumer law center had me change my addresss to their office?

read in debt who cares topic or do what i did get top bk attorney and they will advise . i stop doing this on my own also read i can sleep now and no call i found that interesting too

Contact your creditors. They will work with you. But keep in mind they are not going to settle for pennies on your dept. They may cut it in half or 60% of it. Do this one by one with each creditor until you are finished. The only problem is that you have to deal with the calls and letters from the others. If you are being sued in court by a creditor, deal with them first.

I signed up for Credit One debt solutions with an address of 9250 Rumsey Rd Ste 100 Columbia MD 21045 but my contract has Hess Kennedy's name on it. What does that mean? I am doing a debt settlement.

Class Action Lawsuit Filed Against Mann Bracken and Creditors Interchange for Violations of Federal Law



CORAL SPRINGS, Fla., April 22 /PRNewswire/ -- A class action lawsuit
was filed on behalf of clients of Hess Kennedy, the Campos Chartered Law
Firm and the Consumer Law Center for violations of federal debt collection
laws against Mann Bracken, LLC and Creditors Receivable Management, LLC.
The lawsuit was filed in Federal Court in the Southern District of Florida
under case number 08-cv-60529.

"Our firm has been vigorously fighting for the rights of consumers
against collection agencies and now we have taken the step to have a suit
filed on behalf of our clients in order to continue to aggressively pursue
the rights of consumers," said Laura Hess.

Hess Kennedy, the Campos Chartered Law Firm and the Consumer Law Center
are all law firms providing services to consumers with a specific focus on
evaluating the actions of creditors and credit collection agencies and
their compliance with Federal and State consumer protection laws such as
the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, Fair Credit Billing Act and the
Fair Credit Reporting Act.

WOW PR Newswire?????.......LOL. They are going to great lengths to say they are legit. I don't think it's a real article folks..LOL. This is insane. I'm starting to think that these people are very dangerous. On every article the source is provided by Hess Kennedy. Any shock there...LOL. Here is another article about them.

debt settlement Complaints Lead to Search for 'Attorney'


A man named Edward T. Kennedy is listed as a name partner at the embattled Hess Kennedy law firm in Coral Springs, Fla., but no one with that name is licensed to practice law in Florida.
A Florida Bar complaint filed March 13 against Laura Hess, the Hess in Hess Kennedy, notes Florida lawyers are barred from forming partnerships with nonlawyers in a legal practice. The thrust of the complaint is that the law firm is running a "deceptive debt settlement scheme" that is long on fees and short on assistance.

The law firm and related companies are targets of hundreds of consumer complaints nationally, and the Better Business Bureau of Southeast Florida gave it a failing grade. No one has estimated the full scope of an alleged debt scheme, but in North Carolina alone, more than 220 residents claimed they paid Hess Kennedy more than $500,000.

State corporate records at various times list addresses for Kennedy in Coral Springs, New York and the Cayman Islands.

New York lawyer Edward T. Kennedy is a taxation attorney and accountant with a law firm in Manhattan. Asked Monday if he had any connection to the Coral Springs firm, Kennedy said, "No, not at all." But he said he was asked the same question by the West Virginia attorney general's office about two months ago.

A Chase Bank lawsuit filed in February against the law firm claims Kennedy may be Edward Cherry, who is listed in state corporate records as a business partner in Hess Kennedy and several affiliated companies.

The Bar joined the attorneys general of Florida, North Carolina and West Virginia, Chase Bank and Cherry's former employer in court against Hess Kennedy, its affiliates or its principals. Hess denied Kennedy and Cherry are the same person in a countersuit filed against the bank March 7, saying: "Edward T. Kennedy is a human being who is not Edward Cherry. Edward Kennedy resides in Brussels." No other information about Kennedy was provided.

But the existence or whereabouts of Kennedy may be the least of the problems facing Hess and Cherry. Hess, a Florida Bar member since 2000, is fighting the 10-count, 119-page complaint in her second run-in with the Bar. She was disciplined with a public reprimand in 2005 for drunken driving convictions. Cherry is a defendant in a pending Broward County civil suit claiming he embezzled at least $600,000 from the company he worked for just prior to joining the Hess Kennedy businesses. His attorney said Cherry committed no wrongdoing. Hess could not be reached for comment despite repeated requests via phone, e-mail, a message left in person at her Coral Springs office and through her attorneys. Cherry could not be reached for comment at the law firm or by phone.

The Florida Bar alleges Hess Kennedy's operation is "designed to extract upfront fees from financially strapped clients whether or not any useful services are performed" for them. Clients "rarely obtain debt settlements ... and end up in a far worse financial position" than before.

The Bar also claims:

Hess and her agents are running an illegal advance-fee scam.
She failed to provide clients with competent representation.
She charged excessive fees for her services and shared fees with nonlawyers.
The firm failed to place customer payments into trust or escrow accounts as promised in advertising and agreements or by sales agents as required by Bar regulations.
In her reply Monday to the Bar complaint, Hess denied operating any scheme and rejected allegations that her firm intentionally preyed upon unsophisticated clients to collect large legal fees. She conceded some of her client agreements specified funds would be placed in client escrow accounts for subsequent payment to creditors but acknowledged no such funds were maintained. In an earlier response to the Bar last October, she said funds collected were for legal fees and not to pay clients' creditors.

Hess attorneys Culver Smith of Fox Rothschild in West Palm Beach and Kevin Tynan of Richardson & Tynan in Tamarac filed for dismissal of the complaint. Palm Beach Circuit Judge Jack Cook has been appointed as the referee to hear the trial. No date has been set.

Tynan told the Bar last October that "Hess and her law firm are engaged in some very cutting-edge litigation in a very technical area of the law that is heavily regulated." While there have been some "growing pains" at the firm, he said there should be no charges against Hess because clients who complained had gotten refunds. The Bar complaint noted Hess Kennedy gave almost no refunds until the professional investigation began.

As for Cherry, he was sued in 2003 by his former employer, Internet Billing of Deerfield Beach, which claims he embezzled at least $600,000 days before he abruptly resigned from the firm.

The suit said Cherry was listed as Internet Billing's "in-house counsel" even though he is not licensed to practice law in Florida. The company claims Cherry revived and had total control over an administratively dissolved Florida company called Esquire Escrow and used his position at Internet Billing, known as iBill, to get fellow employees to funnel company funds to Esquire Escrow.

Three days before quitting iBill in February 2003, Cherry made a $500,000 withdrawal from Esquire Escrow. The withdrawal slip filed as an exhibit in the case said the money was transferred "to personal and children's accounts." Cherry also made tens of thousands of dollars in additional cash withdrawals of Esquire Escrow funds from money machines and from banks during 2001 and 2002, court documents showed.

Bank records included in the court file show Cherry withdrew at least $12,200 from Esquire Escrow accounts at ATM machines in May 2002. A company bank card was used for a $763 purchase at a Sunglass Hut the same month and $3,130 in charges at Fort Lauderdale's upscale Voodoo Lounge the next month.

In an Oct. 30, 2003, deposition, Cherry invoked his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination and refused to answer any questions about what happened to the money moved from iBill to Esquire Escrow.

Boca Raton solo practitioner Charles Wender, who represents Cherry and who was present at the 2003 deposition, said Cherry's "position is that he is totally innocent and these are just wild allegations that they obviously can't prove."

Internet Billing attorney Anthony Carriuolo of Berger Singerman of Fort Lauderdale, who conducted the deposition, said documents show Cherry "was just siphoning off tons of money."

HI, I JUST SIGNED UP WITH THEM, AND NOW I AM TRYING TO CANCEL MY ACCOUNT. I WILL SEND IT IN WRITING, THEY HAVE ALREADY UNJUSTLY DEBITED MY BANK ACCOUNT. I WAS DIRECTED TO THEM THROUGH NETDEBT.COM WHICH IS A SCAM FROM CALIFORNIA. I HOPE LAURA HESS AND FAMILY ROT IN JAIL FOR THEIR SCAMS.

I would argue that debt collectors are having a harder time with clients represented by scam artists.

.27 on the dollar is the average settlement and these guys represent you in court if you get sued. Name one settlement company that does that?

HESS KENNEDY IS IN BIG TROUBLE NOONE SHOULD USE THEM....

After reading all this about Consumer Law Center in Coral Springs FL, I will be cancelling my account. I had payed them over a month and a half ago and I keep getting the run around. They say that the accounting dept doesn't have the paid in full status in their systems and they can't negotiate until it says so. Well, as I said I had paid them off over a month and a half ago. I got a letter in the mail saying that my pay is going to be garnished because an attorney never showed up which they also delay me to explain. Save yourself and negotiate with creditors yourself.

Me and my wife just found out today that this company has been shut down... We have been giving them $370 a month for a year now and were informed that we may not get any of it back... Meanwhile the creditors that we hired them to settle with for us have all turned our accounts over to Law Firms of there own for collection...This is a nightmare!!! I only wish I had seen this forum sooner...

We signed up with them and they took 3K out of my account. I received a letter from Chase saying the same thing as the above mentions. There is supposed to be a settlement by April, but I think it's just another pain in the a.. Go figure, the rich get rich and the poor are getting robbed and poorer.

I payed Laural Hess $1540.00 i stayed with out food to pay her every month am poor woman i leave of pay check after pay check i have a rent to pay but god be with her i wish he good luck

I payed Laural Hess $1540.00 i stayed with out food to pay her every month am poor woman i leave of pay check after pay check i have a rent to pay but god be with her i wish he good luck

It is true. I am in the class action law suit to try to get some of my monies back, the worse part is that my credit is ruined and its been over 2yrs since I have paid my cards since I went with this scam. All above letters are true. I am feeling frozen and I don't know what to do with all the calls from collectors..

Quote:

wow. your an idiot if you think we haven't. Your an even bigger fool if you don't think they've been shut down! The AG of Florida did shut them down, they opened up again under a new name! I lost over $17,000 to them and people need to know through blogs what kind of people they are! If you don't believe me, just google class action suits against them! Dah!

Have you read the reports? Hess-Kennedy had to settle in a class action lawsuit in 2009 for not settling $3,000,000 worth of people's debt. I was one of them. I'm a single mother, going to school to get my bachelor's degree. I couldn't afford to pay the entire debt left by my ex-husband so I contacted Hess-Kennedy for help.

People post here to warn others. I wish these comments were posted BEFORE I made the mistake of giving $4,000 to a bunch of scam artists. I could not afford to LOSE that much money! I DID contact the Attorney General and I eventually found out that the Florida Bar was handling the case. Following, is the letter I sent them. (In the end, I received $1,000 from the settlement in early 2010 and am still out over $3,000. Their settlement website http://www.lbfmiami.com/active_cases_receiverships_hess.html

no longer exists and I don't think I'll ever receive the full amount they stole from me.)

September 23, 2008

Ms. P.J. Osborne, Coordinator
Client???s Security Fund
The Florida Bar
651 East Jefferson Street
Tallahassee, FL 32399-2300

Re: Laura L. Hess
Client???s Security Fund Claim No. 09-8097, and letter from Feingold & Kam, sent on September 10, 2008.

Dear Ms. Osborne,

I initiated a complaint against Laura Hess due to inadequate service and failure to settle my accounts as promised in the Agreement signed with Hess Kennedy on September 29th of 2006. This is all mentioned in my Statement of Claim provided earlier.

The letter written to you on September 10, 2008 from David Feingold, on behalf Ms. Hess, states that the ???Agreement does not in any way specify that Hess would be responsible for paying the Claimant???s credit card bill??? as I submitted in the Statement of Claim. He refers to Exhibit ???1???, Paragraph 1; this being the Agreement signed between Hess Kennedy and myself.

In Exhibit ???1???, paragraph 2, however, it clearly states that ???Attorneys shall receive cleared funds monthly form [sic] client to be place into Attorneys??? trust account for the purpose of distributing to Client???s creditors upon a settlement being successfully negotiated or until termination.??? I understood this to mean that the money I paid them ($4, 371.08) would be used to pay off my creditors when a settlement had been negotiated. I also understood, based on Exhibit ???1???, paragraph 3, that the Attorney???s fee (14% of total debt placed in the program) was included in this final amount.

I paid the first four months on a monthly schedule, but asked if I could pay the remaining balance in July of 2007. This was approved and I was told that the remaining balance was $3,576.32. I sent a check for the remaining balance and was sent a return letter stating that I was paid in full.

When I chose to terminate the Agreement with Hess Kennedy, John B. Warren, Attorney at Law, sent a letter of termination on my behalf to Hess Kennedy in May 2008. In this letter, I asked for a refund of the money owed me and I never heard anything in return from Laura Hess or her company. I called my case manager (Shaunia) at Hess Kennedy for three weeks, until I was finally able to get through to her via e-mail. In her response, she told me that I needed to send in a Cancellation Notice to the Special Services department via e-mail. I did this on May 29, 2008. I still received no response.

The next time I called, I was told that Joen was now assigned to my case. I also wrote an e-mail to her regarding cancellation of the Agreement and refund, as I never received a return phone call from her. She never once responded to me.

For lack of communication on their part, I have had no reason to believe that Hess Kennedy has followed through on their end of this Agreement in anyway. I have all above referenced correspondence if you need that for your records.

Thank you,
R. Haack