Legal Question in Elder Law in California
CIvil Suit pleading
We recently hired a attorney that
overcharge us for his services. Now
we still have to respond to this civil
suit for $250,000.00. Our time is
running out and we would like to
respond and deny the claims. What
form to we use for this? And what
are the steps after? We have no
more money so we have to do this
on our own for now.
3 Answers from Attorneys
Re: CIvil Suit pleading
I won't comment on the overcharge claim; litigation fees are very high, in the tens of thousands. If you're going to do this as pro per's, you should go to the library or book stores and read as many self help books as you can find. There are some. Check also on Amazon.com for such books.
A few 'hints' from this site are going to do you no good. Court rules and procedures have to be understood and followed, and you'll have to figure out how to do discovery requests and responses, law and motion preparation, and introduction of testimony and other evidence at trial. These are things you learn in several years of law school and get by experience in practice. A few hints on how to do surgery also wouldn't do you a lot of good if you were sick. Your local law library has sets of 'Civil Procedure Before and During Trial' practice aid type books for lawyers, from companies such as Rutter Group and CEB. We use them all the time, but we have learned how to do so over time. They can be quite overwhelming for a novice.
You have a right to be scared, you have to do correctly all the things that an attorney would do for you.
I suggest you contact the local Lawyers Referral Service and local Bar Association to see if there are any 'public interest' or 'poverty law' legal firms willing to help you on reduced or waived fee arrangement. Check for them yourselves in the yellow pages and on line.
Re: CIvil Suit pleading
In addition, check with your local church, charitable groups, etc, to see if they can provide help or direction to someone.
Re: CIvil Suit pleading
We could not possibly answer this question without knowing more about your case.
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