It started out with a single odd GBP profile… and then we saw an in-house marketer posting on a private social page about a very similar profile, 600 miles away… and then another agency… and then three more firms complained of the same GBP pattern in different markets across the US.
Alexander Shunnarah Trial Attorneys has built one of the most recognizable brands in personal injury law. If you set foot in Alabama, you’ll run into his face, prominently displayed on a billboard, asking you to “Call Me Alabama.” Missing comma aside, the firm has built a strong physical presence in Alabama and beyond. The firm’s website also lists locations across 34 states, creating the appearance of an extensive network of local offices. But what does “local” really mean?
Our deeper review found AI Generated Google Business profiles, generic law firm names, addresses associated with a mailbox services, calls routed to centralized intake and additional practices that go hand in hand with a scaled AI SPAM campaign targeting Local Search.
First, more about that initial office:
On August 25, 2026, someone asked us about a single, suspiciously generic Google My Business Profile of a firm named “Huntsville Car Accident Lawyer”. The entire profile reeked of AI, from the imagery (yeah – check out the otherworldy reflective ‘paint’ on that car accident picture) to the content and even in the 11 reviews. And yes, the “firm” even had pictures of multiple seven fingered lawyers…
Click through to the associated generic website which presented itself as a lead generation site – no presence of a specific law firm or lawyers; however, if you make a call to the phone numbers listed on either the GBP profile or website, it went straight to Shunnarah’s intake team. The phone connection provides a direct link between the generic profile and the firm’s intake operation. Take a listen…
Google advises businesses to provide a phone number that connects to the individual location and recommends using a local number instead of a central call-center number whenever possible.
UPDATE: The Huntsville site and some others have since been replaced with Shunnarah off-shot sites as the destination for the GBP profiles; although the generic firm name in the Company Name field has persisted.
Obviously, per Google’s GBP Guidelines, lead generation agents and/or companies are not eligible for a profile. Profiles must represent real-world businesses. Its guidelines also state that individual practitioners, including lawyers, must operate in a public-facing role and be directly contactable during the posting’s stated hours of operation. This of courses raises a useless hypothetical question: Is a lead generation website hiding behind a real firm technically in violation of Google’s guidelines?
And this was just the first… Poking around the web, researching some of the other complaints and reaching out to some trusted agency partners, we were able to find many these profiles, all following the similar pattern: Generic Name, AI content, strongish review profile all funneling leads directly to… Shunnarah’s intake. These profiles needed to be individually identified (unless you are Google with access to the records, but I’ll come back to that later) – given the multiple profiles we were able to ID in and around various cities, we suspect they number well in the hundreds.
Reviews Raise Additional Questions
This of course raises the very concerning question of the reviews associated with these profiles – each of which had between 10-20 reviews, written within the same 1-3 week timeframe. The reviews themselves were questionable – Reviewers appeared to have very limited histories, often with only one or two reviews, and multiple reviews used noticeably similar language and tone and none of them referred to Shunnarah, instead naming the firm “[Practice Area] + [Geography] Law Firm” As shown in the screen cap below. These characteristics do not independently prove that a review or profile is fraudulent, but it certainly gives cause for concern – especially reviews for a business that does not exist. In fact, low-activity reviewer counts, questionable imagery, and the absence of a clearly local business can collectively signal that a profile deserves further investigation. It’s just not believable that within a tight timeframe of a few weeks, multiple Shunnara clients would leave reviews on the wrong Google Profile instead of the law firm’s actual listing and none of them would reference the law firm, Shunnara, but instead the generic law firm “name”.
What This Looks Like…
As mentioned previously, Alexander Shunnarah Trial Attorneys lists locations across 34 states. We found many offices spanning the country and all following the predictable model: firm name generic “PI Practice Area + Location” complete with 10-20 very recent (and only very recent) 5-star reviews
All of these generic listings in Alabama eventually direct prospective business to Shunnarah:
And here’s a cluster in New Orleans. AI generated images of generic white lawyers posing in front of similar buildings and similar walkways with similar landscaping and overly generic legal imagery.
This reeks of AI, especially if you cross reference the imagery with what 2700 Canal St really looks like… it’s a multi-use nail salon/bar/noodle house/spa. So much for the bougie landscaping.
Additionally, the presence suggested by these location pages does not always resemble a traditional network of staffed law offices. For example an address associated with the firm at 511 South Orange Avenue in Newark, New Jersey, corresponds to M.A.I.L. Box Services, LLC rather than an obvious Alexander Shunnarah office, as shown below:
And here’s a firm in Apartment #99:
Google’s Business Profile guidelines specifically state that remote mailboxes are not acceptable Business Profile locations. A business renting a mailing address without operating from it is considered a virtual office, which is not eligible for a profile. Offices in coworking spaces must have clear signage, receive customers during business hours, and be staffed during those hours by the business’s own employees.
Everything Funnels to Shunnarah
Oftentimes when you click through on one of the generic GBP listings, you now end up on a Shunnarah website. (I know in many cases this has changed from our initial examples, all of which pointed to generic lead generation sites.)
Some of the listings are still tied to generic, brandless destinations, but make that call from either GBP or the site and…. Shunnarah. The website below, tied to the Mobile Car Accident Lawyer goes to a site that has everything you’d expect to see on a law firm site, except for… the name or profile of any lawyer.
And when you call any of these generic firms – either from the GBP listing or the generic website… direct to Shunnarah’s intake team. And yes, texts to these generic listings also do return from…. Shunnarah.
Where is Google?
I don’t know… this pattern is imminently recognizable as it is so very flagrant. There’s no way Google can’t systemically identify these profiles thinly veiled. It was only a matter of time until it surfaced. I wasn’t the only one seeing this pattern; some of these screenshots came from another agency, a direct Shunnarah law firm competitor and 4 other law firms backchannel conversations who were all being hurt by the SPAM.
Is anything going to happen? 6 years ago, this could have triggered a company wide penalty from Mountainview. But today? I’m not so sure – we have certainly slid backwards. But if they do get whacked and you work for an agency – go claim credit to your clients and buy me a beer some time.