Legal Question in Civil Litigation in California

I am happy that my prior advice was helpful.

You are not in a very good position with this former friend. As a practical matter it seems that he has no assets except for the trailer so you are not going to be able to collect anything from him except at most the trailer, which you claim he does not own anyway. Since he was waiting to collect disability benefits which probably were on the basis of not being able to do the work you hired him to do, he will likely bring that up to try to discredit your Small Claims suit [you can only recover money and not title to or the trailer unless you sue in Superior Court and he will probably sell the trailer before you can get a judgment there as that will take 3-4 months at least]. He will argue that the trailer was a gift as why else would you put it into his name. In any suit, it will be his word against yours; if he was in prison for a felony that involved going against normal moral standards [lying, stealing, etc.] you can raise that to attack his credibility but many people who have just gotten got of jail have developed their skills at being dishonest. It probably is best to just get him out of your hair and mark the money off as being a somewhat cheap lesson in life.

not proof read