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Alchenar posted:Real talk: the justice system is not there to right moral wrongs over small beans. And yes a few thousand dollars is small beans and the cost to society of court time to deal with your issue almost certaintly outweighs that. I don't disagree. I actually kind of agree that the friction involved is a feature, not a bug. It keeps Karen out of the court for suing for really stupid poo poo and waste enormous amounts of the court's time. The problem here though is situations not unlike mine, where a few thousand dollars are at stake. If this was me circa 2015, this would be a devastating expense that I would just have to absorb abd probably couldn't. The addition cost of $400~ just to successfully file a case would be a major issue. If there is *too much* friction, then it's trivial for people to defraud other individuals out of substantial amounts of money. If there is effectively no penalty for 'theft' of under $2500, then there is probably an 'Access to Justice' issue in the system. Basically, there is a balance that needs to be made here between, 'Karen consumes the court' and 'The effective minimum claim worth pursing is five figures'. I'm not sure where it needs to be, or how that should look, but people that have experienced a relatively devastating financial injustice should be able to seek that justice reasonably. Canine Blues Arooo fucked around with this message at 20:08 on May 31, 2022 |
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May 31, 2022 20:05
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Canine Blues Arooo posted:I'm gonna be dead honest here: Even if I dotted all my I's just so and get a judgement, I kinda don't expect to collect. yea a judgement should show up on a credit check if they do not pay and you follow procedures to file that they have not paid in the [x] days.
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May 31, 2022 20:09
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Canine Blues Arooo posted:I don't disagree. I actually kind of agree that the friction involved is a feature, not a bug. It keeps Karen out of the court for suing for really stupid poo poo and waste enormous amounts of the court's time. A $50 fee to submit a basic 1/2-page explanation of the issue, and if a clerk thinks it has basic merit it's allowed to advance? If people want to throw $50 after $50 on frivolous bullshit well the clerk is still getting paid for their half-hour so cost to the system is still minimal.
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May 31, 2022 21:03
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You can usually get filing fees waived by filing out in forma pauperis forms. Depending on the state. Many family law filings are free . Once you actually pay the initial cost there is no additionally filing fees (varies).
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May 31, 2022 21:13
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Courts are funded by fees and real money in the form of state taxes. They don’t get free money from the Fed (usually ).
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May 31, 2022 21:15
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Canine Blues Arooo posted:I don't disagree. I actually kind of agree that the friction involved is a feature, not a bug. It keeps Karen out of the court for suing for really stupid poo poo and waste enormous amounts of the court's time. Well, there are a number of ways to solve that. Norway has a arbitration tribunal that is a tier below small claims court, but it has the power of summons and the power to render verdict for no-shows in addition to actual arbitration. It has an upper bound in terms of types of cases and monetary value, but it's designed for pro se and absolutely no lawyers need be involved. Every municipality has one. It's damned near free and you can claim limited costs. For tenant law, there a special tribunal that handles cases. It's very low cost and is staffed by specialist lawyers who will handle your claim through a simple written process unless meetings are needed. Again, very cheap, pro se and they can render verdicts. They are usually so good at tenant/landlord issues it's pointless to appeal them to small claims. Claiming after verdict is done through the police, and is a beurocratic process where you simply apply and have a case worker go through a claims process and garnish wages or repossess as needed, with state authority. No need for a lawyer, the state is responsible for due process and has the needed information through state records of taxes, central registry of address and property registry. So try moving here I guess?
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May 31, 2022 21:19
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The USA has low cost courts for LT issues in many states.
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May 31, 2022 21:22
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Outrail posted:A $50 fee to submit a basic 1/2-page explanation of the issue, and if a clerk thinks it has basic merit it's allowed to advance? If people want to throw $50 after $50 on frivolous bullshit well the clerk is still getting paid for their half-hour so cost to the system is still minimal. Yeah, that's not actually capturing the expense involved. I think my filing fee was $29, but the court itself doesn't accept direct filing (or at least the court website implies this a lot), you have to go through a service, which then tacks on another $20. Service was absolutely a killer, clocking in around $150~ all said and done. I have to sue in the county of the defendant, so I have to travel across LA - there and back is gonna be $100 on the low side. I have to print various documents, which is a relatively trivial expense, but adds up. I don't think I'm underestimating my costs here to be around $400. It's not a trivial amount of money for many people.
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May 31, 2022 22:01
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So am already getting a lawyer for this but wanted to Just Post and see what ya'll think: I posted a page or two ago I needed to move states for a medical disability. I'm not legally recognized as disabled by any state but for the purpose of me being able to work remotely my provider was/is willing to write doctors notes explaining as such. So for the legal part: Before the decision was made to move I signed a lease for an apartment to move into for July. I contacted them 45 days before the lease start date per the terms in the lease if I had any issues I needed to bring up. Told them about the disability, how my job was already providing me an accommodation to work remotely, and why I can't move in cus it would be bad for my health. The management company presents me with two options: 1. Pay them 3 months rent upon which I would get refunded up to a month and half depending on when they manage to get a new tenant in + "marketing fees" which had no amount but my assumption here is no matter what Im basically paying them close to the full 3 months. 2. Find a replacement tenant except they will not relist the apartment themselves or even provide me with pictures for me to list it on like craigslist or something. Even if I were to find a replacement I still owe them some fees that it looks like they just made up on the spot because they're not mentioned in the lease at all. I don't wanna have to do any of that poo poo so I have a meeting with the lawyer my job provides through my benefits this week but wondering if anyone has any experience with something like this. I know every states tenant laws are different, this would be in PA and through some research it looks like tenant law is pretty hosed in PA lol.
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May 31, 2022 22:35
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Canine Blues Arooo posted:I don't disagree. I actually kind of agree that the friction involved is a feature, not a bug. It keeps Karen out of the court for suing for really stupid poo poo and waste enormous amounts of the court's time. I think some other countries do a "loser pays" kinda thing. If you sue and get beat you're on the hook for the other sides defense. If you win they pay the judgment and expenses. Or something like that. IANAL. But it sounds great in theory. I'd love to hear the actual lawyers opinion on this.
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May 31, 2022 23:58
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honda whisperer posted:I think some other countries do a "loser pays" kinda thing. If you sue and get beat you're on the hook for the other sides defense. If you win they pay the judgment and expenses. Or something like that. IANAL. Sounds like the party with more money gets to keep their money.
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Jun 1, 2022 01:44
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Semi-hypothetical here, and I'm sure this varies from state to state and town to town.... A friend of mine (Alan) had his dog (german shepherd) off the leash in his yard. A neighbor, Barry, (who my friend has bad blood with) walked by the house and they got into an argument. Barry was recording and the dog growled at him, but never left the yard. Things ended without incident, but Barry called the cops anyway because the dog growled at him. Cops said, "no crime, not our problem", and that was the end of it. WHAT IF... The situation escalated and Barry physically attacked Alan, on Alan's property, and the dog attacked Barry. Would that still fall under self defense, or would there be a case that it is a vicious dog? Skunkduster fucked around with this message at 02:53 on Jun 1, 2022 |
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Jun 1, 2022 02:51
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honda whisperer posted:I think some other countries do a "loser pays" kinda thing. If you sue and get beat you're on the hook for the other sides defense. If you win they pay the judgment and expenses. Or something like that. IANAL. Loser pays is often referred to as “the English rule”, in contrast to the “pay your own way” rule, referred to as “the American rule.” In practice, they each have different advantages and disadvantages, and American statutory law incorporates fee shifting in some areas to mimic something closer to the English rule. Loser pays systems have the advantage that meritorious litigation isn’t (in theory) blocked by inability to pay for counsel. But contingency counsel (the ones who take X% of winnings) provide that ability too. Loser pays does likely create a little more litigation overall, because people are rarely thinking about what happens if they lose. Loser pays biggest advantage is actually for defendants, who can use it as a way to justify defending themselves instead of settling. (Other aspects of the American civil legal system - in particular, discovery - overwhelm this pro-litigation trend and result in the US still being particularly litigation friendly.) The American rule is less obviously beneficial. It makes access to justice harder, because you’re always stuck stuck paying for your lawyers. At the same time, it also makes nuisance litigation more profitable, since defendants can’t look forward to their fees being paid if they fight, so nuisance value settlements become a thing. Because you can contract out of either rule (ie, American parties to a contract can choose to have the English rule apply to any disputes between them), contracting practices actually serve as a proxy for what parties think is efficient, at least in that context. And in that context, more often than not the parties do choose to contractually select the English rule, suggesting it’s viewed as at least a little better overall. There’s also the trade off of vigorous advocacy - under the English rule, you might not want to drive up litigation costs because you’re on the hook if you lose. At the same time, because you’re on the hook if you lose, you have an incentive to fight harder to avoid paying their fees. In the end, I tend to agree with this statement from the linked law review article: “Legal economists have created a virtual cottage industry of analyzing the various incentive and efficiency effects of different fee regimes. But the volume of ink these analysts have spilled has not resulted in agreement as to the relative social utility of the rules.” Kalman fucked around with this message at 01:19 on Jun 2, 2022 |
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Jun 1, 2022 03:05
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Ghosthotel posted:So am already getting a lawyer for this but wanted to Just Post and see what ya'll think: I mean at the end of the day you signed a contract and now want to get out of it, and paying the other side an agreed upon sum of money to compensate for breaking the contract is a standard way to do that. I don’t even really see in here any argument to get out of the lease besides that you don’t want it anymore, and since you read the contract I assume you would have noted something that gave you the option to back out. You should also keep in mind that getting into a lawsuit over the rent may make it hard to get an apartment in the future.
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Jun 1, 2022 03:20
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evilweasel posted:You should also keep in mind that getting into a lawsuit over the rent may make it hard to get an apartment in the future. I'm painfully aware of this as I once lived in an apartment building with a completely uncontrolled bed bug infestation and when I said I was going to break the lease with the landlord (under the conditions that the property was unlivable) she filed for an eviction. Even though I was never actually evicted and she agreed to break the lease early once it became apparent the entire building was a poo poo show that filing for the eviction has popped up in pretty much every apartment application I've made in the past 5 years even though I was completely in the right per the lease agreement to break it. Ghosthotel fucked around with this message at 07:33 on Jun 1, 2022 |
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Jun 1, 2022 07:30
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The other thing about the English rule is that it stops applying if you reject a settlement offer that is better than what the final judgement ends up being and can actually reverse direction from the moment of the offer if the victorious party was particularly unreasonable about continuing litigation. The system works pretty well to stack everyone's economic incentives towards making and accepting reasonable offers.
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Jun 1, 2022 07:51
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SkunkDuster posted:Semi-hypothetical here, and I'm sure this varies from state to state and town to town.... Gonna depend on where you live, state/county/federal laws and ordinances, etc, and whether the cops show up blasting or not Legitimate self defense, a prosecutor probably wouldn't want to touch the case. Whether your dog survives in the meantime again depends on whether the cops show up blasting or not
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Jun 1, 2022 16:59
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The technicalities of the legal argument pale beside what happens when the cops shows up and a dude is bleeding from a dog bite. Because Barry is gonna say the dog attacked him out of nowhere and nobody is gonna watch the video for months and in the meanwhile they might make you rabies test the dog (which is lethal), depending on your local law and the dogs vaccination status.
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Jun 1, 2022 17:04
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Adventures in Small Claims, an Update: Showed up to Court today. Found out my hearing was actually virtual. This is noted on the case receipt that the court sent upon successful filing. The problem here is that it was sent to the 3rd party that handled filing and service and I never got it. I didn't know to look for it at all, so I just showed up to the courthouse today and found out I had a virtual meeting. I scrambled to get poo poo together for that, and after I got stuff submitted digitally, i was rejected because it was a zip file... But no worries, I was standing right outside the courtroom and they just did an in-person hearing, which was very nice. Defendant didn't show. I basically needed to show that my roommate didn't pay me and the total sum owed, as well as a written agreement (which I did have). I had my poo poo together for this, the judge looked it over and handed me a judgement for amount owed + costs after about 10 minutes. So, I now have a judgement officially. Something I noticed is that in my 'pool' of Small Claims cases, almost all of them were dismissed that day because of failure to prove service. In this case, the $150 I paid to have someone serve the defendant was totally worth it, because they did file it correctly and I ended up getting that back as part of the judgement anyway (on paper at least). Make sure you have your service done correctly, folks. Anyway, I have a judgement now. The odds of me collecting ain't great, but this was an interesting adventure if nothing else. If anyone has advice on what steps I should take to collect on that judgement, I'd be very, very interested in hearing said advice.
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Jun 1, 2022 23:25
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Congrats on getting your judgment.
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Jun 1, 2022 23:31
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You get to say "Judgement Day has come", unironically, so that's nice.
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Jun 1, 2022 23:50
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Kalman posted:Loser pays is often referred to as “the English rule”, in contrast to the “pay your own way” rule, referred to as “the American rule.” That's a good post, thanks!
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Jun 2, 2022 01:07
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:The technicalities of the legal argument pale beside what happens when the cops shows up and a dude is bleeding from a dog bite. Because Barry is gonna say the dog attacked him out of nowhere and nobody is gonna watch the video for months and in the meanwhile they might make you rabies test the dog (which is lethal), depending on your local law and the dogs vaccination status. I've never been in a situation where I've needed to record an interaction. If the cops showed up and both parties had opposing stories, but one of them had a video recording of the incident, wouldn't the cop watch it on the spot? If it showed the other party was clearly lying, wouldn't the cop have every right to cite them for filing a false report or making a false statement?
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Jun 2, 2022 01:19
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I've seen that play out in reality, the cop seized the video playing device as evidence and left without doing anything else
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Jun 2, 2022 02:25
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SkunkDuster posted:I've never been in a situation where I've needed to record an interaction. If the cops showed up and both parties had opposing stories, but one of them had a video recording of the incident, wouldn't the cop watch it on the spot? If it showed the other party was clearly lying, wouldn't the cop have every right to cite them for filing a false report or making a false statement? In theory sure and sometimes that happens but also sometimes the person with the recording is brown or female or gay and so they don't want to bother because they've already decided who they're gonna arrest
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Jun 2, 2022 02:42
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Javid posted:I've seen that play out in reality, the cop seized the video playing device as evidence and left without doing anything else Keep in mind that cops aren't district attorneys, much less judges. They're not really supposed to do anything else. Can't arrest somebody without a warrant, can't charge someone without a grand jury. Obviously there's an enormous stack of exceptions and nuances, but you don't want a cop squinting at a cell phone video with no context and no chain of evidence in the heat of the moment and hauling someone off to jail on no one's opinion but his own.
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Jun 2, 2022 02:44
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Canine Blues Arooo posted:Adventures in Small Claims, an Update: Congrats, you now have more trial experience than like 75% of all lawyers
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Jun 2, 2022 03:06
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Jun 2, 2022 03:08
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Captain von Trapp posted:Keep in mind that cops aren't district attorneys, much less judges. They're not really supposed to do anything else. Can't arrest somebody without a warrant, can't charge someone without a grand jury. Obviously there's an enormous stack of exceptions and nuances, but you don't want a cop squinting at a cell phone video with no context and no chain of evidence in the heat of the moment and hauling someone off to jail on no one's opinion but his own. Don't they do this anyway?
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Jun 2, 2022 03:23
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Captain von Trapp posted:Keep in mind that cops aren't district attorneys, much less judges. They're not really supposed to do anything else. Can't arrest somebody without a warrant, can't charge someone without a grand jury. Obviously there's an enormous stack of exceptions and nuances, but you don't want a cop squinting at a cell phone video with no context and no chain of evidence in the heat of the moment and hauling someone off to jail on no one's opinion but his own. Um. You may be surprised to know that even with the stacks of equivocations, "Obviously there's an enormous stack of exceptions and nuances" is doing a lot of heavy lifting. Police can (and will, and do) arrest people without warrant "with no context and no chain of evidence in the heat of the moment and hauling someone off to jail on no one's opinion but his own" for: Any crime that they observe Plus: Felonies DUIs Threats Domestic violence if they observe an injury or impairment Violations of protective orders Arresting people without warrant "with no context and no chain of evidence in the heat of the moment and hauling someone off to jail on no one's opinion but his own" is what police do. Arrest warrants are the exception, a 1:100 at best. Police investigating and exercising discretion before arresting someone is also the exception, but that ratio is closer to 1:10, depending on officer and departmental leadership.
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Jun 2, 2022 03:34
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I think I hate my lawyer.
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Jun 2, 2022 03:39
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bird with big dick posted:I think I hate my lawyer. Good news, there are a billion other you can engage
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Jun 2, 2022 03:41
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Or casually date if you’re commitment averse
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Jun 2, 2022 03:41
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bird with big dick posted:I think I hate my lawyer. Good odds so do they.
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Jun 2, 2022 03:41
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Hoshi posted:Good news, there are a billion other you can engage I know but it's a pain in the rear end to get rid of them right I'm guessing if I tell them to go pound sand they're gonna bill me $50,000 for the 2 phone calls and 5 one sentence emails they sent me and them cut and pasting a description of my injuries that I gave them into a PI lawsuit template.
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Jun 2, 2022 03:46
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bird with big dick posted:I think I hate my lawyer. You better get paid after bitching in here so much. Don’t get me wrong I hope it happens
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Jun 2, 2022 04:21
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So your lawyer gets paid
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Jun 2, 2022 04:21
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joat mon posted:Um. You may be surprised to know that even with the stacks of equivocations, "Obviously there's an enormous stack of exceptions and nuances" is doing a lot of heavy lifting. Sure, as far as it goes. This is all pretty much "stuff they observed while it was happening", which as you point out is most police work. Because cops like easy. Conversely it is pretty unusual for some random irritated neighbors to bring putative evidence to a cop and have an arrest result without a warrant. If it does, whether and what charges get filled is not up to the cop, whose job is in theory just to hand the guy to the judge for disposition.
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Jun 2, 2022 04:24
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Cool theory bro
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Jun 2, 2022 04:30
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You should assume that given any even-slightly-plausible excuse, that a cop is going to shoot a dog if he has the opportunity.
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