The Court Of Public Opinion

For many people, the court system might as well be a maze. When it comes to a business dispute over a contract, the court system works in a particular manner.

What Courts Hear Contract Disputes?

The court system in the United States actually makes a lot of logical sense if you understand the terminology used. Well, if you are an attorney. The system is broken down by subject matter and then categorized by objective issues like the amount of damages being claimed. Common court branches include criminal, civil and family law divisions to mention just a few.

What court hears business contract disputes? Contract issues are covered under a set of laws known as civil law. If you have been in a lawsuit, you know it is rarely civil! The term, instead, refers to the matter being monetary in nature. At its root, the dispute has money at issue. Contract disputes fall within the business law and civil court jurisdiction. Ah, but there is more.

While civil courts hear contract disputes, the specific court is determined by the amount of money at issue. The exact amounts differ by state, but generally there are three levels. Small claims civil courts decide matters under $5,000 or so and you are not allowed to use an attorney. These are the disputes you see on television. Municipal civil courts usually hear contract disputes that have monetary values above small claims levels but below $25,000. If the claim involves an amount over $25,000, then it is heard in superior court.

Before heading off to court, it is important that you first read the contract in question very closely. Most contracts these days contain arbitration clauses. Arbitration is an effort to resolve things without taking up the time and resources of the court system. If you have such a clause, the parties typically agree to have a retired judge here the dispute and render a judgment in favor of one party.

Business contract disputes happen each and every day. Civil courts are usually going to handle them, but make sure you to check for arbitration clauses.

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As you hear and see over and over in the media, there are a lot of bizarre lawsuits filed in our country. So, what are the options when dealing with frivolous lawsuits?

Your Options with Frivolous Lawsuits

When talking about frivolous lawsuits, it is important to understand a few things first. Simply put, the question of what is frivolous is not as easy to answer as it may seem at first glance. We have all heard about the judgment against McDonalds for three million dollars for serving coffee that was to hot. In that case, however, the lawsuit was not frivolous per se. Instead, it was the judgment returned by the jury that was frivolous and way out of line.

In our justice system, practically anyone can file a lawsuit as long as they have the money to do so. It costs a couple hundred dollars depending on the location. In filing such a lawsuit, the person makes various claims against the defendant. If the claims are so outlandish as to be considered frivolous, the court does not deem them illegal. Lawsuits are a matter of civil law, not criminal law. In short, a civil lawsuit decides fault, not whether something is illegal.

While a judge will not rule a frivolous lawsuit to be illegal, he or she can take another step. As the case proceeds, the defendant can file a motion called a summary judgment. In that motion, the defendant argues that even if all the facts supported by the evidence offered by the plaintiff are presumed to be true, the defendant still has done nothing wrong. If the judge agrees, the lawsuit is over. Depending upon the state, the judge may also be able to award costs and fees to the defendant. The defendant, however, has another bullet in his arsenal.

Upon successfully defending a claim, a defendant has the option to file a malicious prosecution lawsuit. These are sometimes called slap lawsuits in certain states. In such a lawsuit, the defendant argues that the plaintiff filed a frivolous lawsuit for the pure purpose of harassing or causing the defendant to spend money on attorney fees. If the defendant is successful in bringing the claim, he or she can often recover the fees spent on an attorney and other damages dependent upon the relevant state law.

Frivolous lawsuits are a fact of life in our modern society. A determined defendant in a civil lawsuit, however, has the ability to turn around and come back at the plaintiff for filing them.

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1. Lawsuits seek to compensate you for your injuries.

a. They compensate you for:
i. Your lost wages, and your future lost wages,
ii. Your medical expenses, both past and future, and
iii. Your pain and the suffering it caused in the past, and for the future

2. Lawsuits do not directly seek to harm anyones reputation.

3. A doctor who is sued will not lose their medical license if the lawsuit is successful.

4. A lawsuit attempts to compensate the injured victim, and at the same time, try to ensure that the same type of bad treatment is not repeated in another patient.

5. A lawsuit is not a lottery.

a. This phrase is often used by defense attorneys during jury selection to remind jurors that their job is not simply to allow the injured victim to hit it big and award huge amounts of unjustified money.

b. A more realistic approach to a lawsuit is for reasonable, full and fair compensation to allow you to recover all of your past and future expenses, and all of your past and future pain and suffering compensation.

6. You dont have to pay any money upfront to an attorney to handle your case. There is no hourly fee.

a. Medical Malpractice and injury cases are generally handled on contingency.

b. That means that the attorney fee depends upon you winning your case. If you lose, the attorney loses as well, and receives no fee.

c. The expenses that the attorney pays to prosecute your case are technically supposed to be repaid by the client in the event the case is lost. However, as a personal matter, I have never asked a client to reimburse me for my expenses if I lose a case. It just doesnt make sense to do so, and in my personal opinion, its bad business. However, some attorneys do require this, so make sure you ask first before you make your decision.

7. Not every attorney has the same experience.

a. Ask your attorney how many years theyve been in practice,

b. Ask the attorney what percentage of medical malpractice or accident cases he handles compared to other types of cases,

c. Ask whether he/she tries cases in the Supreme Court (its the trial level court for New York,

d. Ask whether hes ever lost a case;

i. If he tries cases, and claims hes never lost a caseId suggest either that the attorney is not being accurate, or simply only accepts clear-cut cases that he cannot lose- thats extremely rare.

ii. The majority of trial attorneys will have lost a case from time to time. Unfortunately, its the nature of the beast.

e. Ask whether the attorney you meet with will be the one handling your case on a day to day basis. If not, who will be your attorney? Whom will you call with questions? How quickly will the attorney call me back? How often can you expect to receive correspondence from the attorney about the status of your case?

8. A lawsuit takes time to come to a conclusion.

a. The average time is 2-3 years from start to finish.

9. How often do I have to come into the attorneys office during this time?

a. Once to meet the attorney in an initial meeting,

b. Once to sign documents that start your lawsuit (often this can be done by mail),

c. Once to have your deposition (where you are asked questions by the other sides attorney),

d. At least once to prepare you for trial, and sometimes two or three additional times to prepare you.

10. As in life, there are no guarantees to winning. However, with good experienced counsel and thorough preparation, you stand a much better chance of being fully informed about your prospects and achieving a good result.

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No one can deny that there are more than enough lawyers in the world choking our nation’s economic engine and industrial capacity. The efficiencies of all sectors of our financial markets are burdened from a nation which is over lawyered, where lawsuits are more common that rat births. Each year thousands of lawyers are accepted into the bar and released into the wild to do their damages on our economic vitality.

But I have some good news and it does not involve saving a bunch of money on my car insurance by switching to Gieko. In fact I am grateful to alert you to the fact that lawyers are on their way out. They will soon be replaced by Holographic Images and robotic humanoids to help you with your case, which is fitting indeed, as many say that lawyers have no souls in fact there is no empirical evidence ever presented in any court of law in the 200-years of United States History showing that they are human at all?

Whether the rumors and stories about Lawyers having no soul are correct or not is immaterial because soon such Holographic Technologies will become a virtual or augmented reality and Lawyers will no longer be needed at all. Now then how do we get rid of the Politicians? Think on this.

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