Should I File A Malpractice Suit, Complain To The Bar Association, Or Do Nothing?

Location: Massachusetts

I have been incredibly understanding with my lawyer, and I'm generally willing to give anyone the benefit of the doubt, but I really think my lawyer is treading into malpractice territory with how she's been handling my case.

The case is a pretty basic contract dispute. I hired a contractor to redo our basement and he screwed up the plumbing and refused to fix it. Lawyer filed a lawsuit and mostly nothing happened with it for about a year.

Get a call from my lawyer that the contractor has filed for Bankruptcy and we should dismiss the case. Sucks, but it was always a possibility. I opt to leave the case open though in case the bankruptcy falls through for some reason. She sends me a link to Pacer and tells me I can follow the bankruptcy proceedings there.

This is where things get weird.

I can't, for the life of me, find his bamkruptcy case. I don't stress about it though and the case remains in pergatory for a few months. There is a pre-trial conference scheduled and I call the lawyer to confirm that it will be postponed due to the automatic stay from the bankruptcy. She assures me it will be.

Get a call from my lawyer a few days later and she actually did have to show up in court. She says the court had no knowledge of a bankruptcy filing and the pre-trial conference went ahead as scheduled. Defendant didn't show up and we got a default judgement. She warns me that the judgement is invalid, however, because of the bankruptcy filing. And that I should wait a year before trying to collect to avoid the defendant filing a motion to have the judgement set aside.

I do some digging in documents my lawyer had sent me in the past and discover that the defense never filed for bankruptcy. Instead, they did something called Assignment for the Benefit of Creditors (ABC). I point this out to my lawyer and ask her why she didn't verify the bankruptcy filing herself and she claimed:

"I do not have access to any bankruptcy filings. Those are only done in the federal courts and I do not have access to those dockets."

Which seems very odd, considering bankruptcy filings are public record.

I call her out and basically say she either doesn't know the difference between bankruptcy and ABC or she didn't review the document she sent me about the ABC. She refuses to admit she screwed up and basically leans on the fact that we won the case anyway, so it shouldn't matter. It does matter, however, because she charged me for conversations we had discussing a bankruptcy that didn't exist. I also might have proceeded different if I'd known the contractor had gone through ABC, and therefore had no incentive to show up to court.

Fast forward and the writ of execution goes missing between the Clerk's office and my lawyer's office. Lawyer claims it was lost in the mail, but I find that very unlikely. Unfortunately the clerk's office didn't do any tracking, so I can't prove my lawyer lost it.

Anyhow, I really feel like my lawyer is inept at best and blatantly lying to me at worst. I don't think it rises to the level of a malpractice suit, but maybe worthy of a bar association complaint? Anyone have any thoughts?

EDIT: the District Court won't issue an alias writ without a motion requesting one and a new hearing to rule on it. Lawyer initially offered to draft the motion free of charge and I could represent myself at the hearing. I pushed back and she begrudgingly agreed to appear herself free of charge.