I was fired from my last job very suddenly and over the phone by the management agency that the company hires to deal with new employees, technically I was considered a temporary employee. Although after a relatively short period of time usually new hires are converted to full employees of the company. The reasoning they gave for my discharge was that I had fallen asleep on the job the day prior to my discharge. That incident never happened. I was willing to offer witnesses in the form of coworkers who wouldve been around me all day. They refused and said I was barred from returning or contacting former coworkers. I ended up applying for unemployment and after a very difficult process, they sided with me. Ever since then the management company has refused to answer calls or emails from me, despite me asking for information from them for other jobs as well as insurance and things like that. They are now appealing the unemployment decision on the grounds that my discharge was justified. A hearing is now scheduled with a judge. Im trying to find out what steps to take. The amount of money this is about is in the realm of $1000 so I thought hiring a lawyer might not be worth it. Any suggestions or advice is welcome.

Some more context. This was a very early morning job. I was struggling to stay alert throughout the longer-than-usual shift. I did have one incident of falling asleep on the job very briefly close to the beginning of my employment there. This also happened during a period of "down-time", a very long period of time in which there is no work to do for a number of reasons. Down-time happened frequently and was not unexpected by the company. I spoke with my manager about this and came up with some solutions so that it wouldnt happen again. I was also told it wouldnt be a problem as long as I was careful about it in the future. On top of that, I found myself getting sick a lot both on and off the job and had multiple absences. I felt that all of this was due to me not being compatible with the shift and was in the process of getting switched to a different shift. Throughout all of this, I kept in regular contact with management who were very willing to help me and understanding. At a certain point they laid out their expectations for me to get hired and I followed them to the letter. I was told that while they understood I was struggling, they need four weeks of perfect attendance and performance before hiring me. I had just finished week 5 under their expectaions when I was fired. During this time, I did everything I could to prove myself. I volunteered for overtime on multiple occasions. I was also being recommended for promotion by one of my leaders and joined a safety and efficiency team. All previous absences would have happened at least 5 weeks prior to my discharge. None of these examples were given when I was fired or in the unemployment determination. Now in the appeal they have changed the reason why I was fired to poor work performance. My biggest concern is that the judge will take their word over mine regarding the falling asleep incident as I cant provide any proof that it didnt happen. I have only one former co-workers number, who was not with me on that day. And even if i could get a hold of the few that would have been around me. They might not be willing to testify as it has been quite a bit of time since the alleged incident.