testimonials

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"Judge Smith was great. She’s a nice person to work with and did a good job lowering the temperature. I would definitely recommend her and plan to use her again."

"I really enjoyed working with Judge Smith. She is a great listener and gets to the heart of the issues. She did really well at giving parties the opportunity to participate in the process in a way that was meaningful for them. I found her to be very effective at reading people and adapting to the circumstances. She gained the confidence of the parties in a short amount of time and got our case resolved before we had to incur the expense of trial prep. The client and I were very pleased with the process that she led and the outcome."

"Great experience, sharp and on point, will definitely use her services in the near future."

"Judge Smith is excellent. We’ve used her a few times in the past and intend to continue doing so moving forward." 

"Judge Smith was great. I appreciated the pre-mediation call. She was prepared, seemed fair, and got the case resolved. This was my first time mediating with Judge Smith and I’d do so again." 

"Judge Smith spent a lot of time with the client at the beginning and my client really liked her.  I found her questioning at the beginning very, very relevant, direct, and efficient.  I feel that she accurately gained a full view of the case and I would use her again. My client loved her."

"I really enjoyed working with Judge Smith. She is very sharp, picked up on the issues very fast and she had a great presence and demeanor with the parties."

"Judge Smith was excellent to work with, and I hold her in high regard. Her efficiency and realistic approach ensured that everything was completed smoothly and effectively. It was a pleasure collaborating with her. I do wish we had signed a term sheet to reflect the agreement, but that oversight is on us."

"I have mediated several cases with Judge Smith. She has been outstanding in every one of them.  I have recommended Judge Smith at every opportunity."

"Judge Smith was fantastic and we would definitely be happy to use her again. When she was on the bench, my experience with her was that she was always very detail-oriented, patient and thoughtful and that certainly carried over to her work now as a mediator."

"Judge Smith was awesome, great and very professional. She even took time to call me on Super Bowl Sunday to get a better understanding of the case before the mediation that was scheduled for the next morning. I'd recommend her for other civil property cases. She's very skilled at explaining law and facts to participants. She should be cloned if possible. She's now on my short list of mediators."

"Hon. Winifred Smith was a spectacular mediator. She used her extensive experience as a judge to offer important insight that our client trusted. She was knowledgeable, empathetic, and practical in her approach. I would definitely use her again."

“What sets Judge Smith apart from other mediators is that she has the judicial experience, but unlike a lot of judges, she doesn’t come in and just say, ‘Well, I think this is how it’s going to go. You’re wrong,’ She comes in and does a great job of educating people about how a court might rule as opposed to telling them that this is what’s going to happen. In persuasion, if I come to a conclusion on my own, that’s a lot more persuasive than if you come to me and tell me what my conclusion should be. She was terrific with the parties. A lot of times, you’ve got litigants that aren’t necessarily as sophisticated as others, and she doesn’t talk down to anybody. She’s just very good at speaking in a way that gets those to the same place who may not normally want to be in the same place.”

“Judge Smith was excellent with clients. She plays well with others, and I really think that helps her have credibility with both sides. She’s very impartial, but she’ll tell you what she thinks. And when she does, she delivers that message in a non-offensive way and in a manner which people are more likely to say, ‘Maybe you’re right.’”

“Judge Smith is incredibly well prepared. I’ve probably done 50 mediations over the years – maybe more – and mediators frequently, unfortunately, come in and you can tell they haven’t read your mediation briefs and they just sort of hit the ground running at the mediation and try to just figure it out as they go along, and that delays things and that sometimes results in not having enough time to get things settled. Judge Smith is the opposite. She clearly knew the case inside and out. She suggested a variety of creative solutions. It wasn’t just, ‘You pay money, and you get money.’ There were just many different ways in which she structured things to try and get things done, and oftentimes, you really need to get creative like that to reach a resolution, and she was clearly very, very invested in trying to get the cases settled.”