Legal Question in Civil Litigation in California
Have a question about how to proceed. We have been served with papers saying we are being sued by an attorney we hired back in 2007, to help us recoup a deposit we had made for a business transaction. That is all done now, and there was nothing able to be reouped. Our attorney did his job, and we owe him about $9000. We had set up payment arrangments with him last year, but my husand fell out of work. As soon as we had some money coming in again, we started making regular payments of $300 a month to him. (We never had an official payment arrangment). He wanted payment in full, but we did and still not not have it.
He startedadding %18 interest to every month that we paid a payment, and basically the principle balance started going up, so we stopepd paying him. It didnt make sense for our family to scrap $300 a motnh to pay him, then to have him add more interest on, when we could have used that $300 for food money for our 3 kids. :(
I voiced this to him, and he said he isnt supposed to make payment arrangements as an attorney, and that full payment is due immediatley. Again, I told him we do not have it.
So, as of this week, we have been served with papers and are being sued, at a court where we used to live 400 miles away. We can not afford to go there, so we are wondering what our rights are, and how we can be represented there on the court date in mid August. Do you have any advice? We can not afford to hire another attorney, and FULLY intend to pay this debt back. But we do not have the money at this point. Please help. Thank you!
2 Answers from Attorneys
I am sorry to hear of this situation. Your description raises many issues that I would like to discuss with you, as your former attorney may be acting unethically. Please call my office to discuss; I may be willing to handle this at no charge.
If you have been sued, you have to deal with the 'process' of answering, motions, etc, and also deal with defenses and facts. If the lawsuit was filed in a county where you lived at the time of the contract, and he didn't know you had moved, it would be ok, or if he filed in the county where he worked and where the contract with you was signed, it would be ok, but if he purposely filed in a county having nothing to do with your residence or his office, then it is possible to force him to move the lawsuit to the correct county. But, if you can't afford to hire an attorney to defend the lawsuit, you sure can't afford to also pay the fees necessary to file motions to move the case.
However, the real issue is that you need to somehow negotiate a payment plan you can afford. He is not legally entitled to charge 18% interest, it is usurious and illegal, and actually would get in trouble with the State Bar and the 'law' for trying to do so. His statement that he isn't supposed to make payment arrangements as an attorney is quite false. He doesn't 'have' to accept payment arrangements, but he isn't legally prevented from doing so.
It may be possible for an attorney to represent you and convince him to take payments and sign an agreement to that effect, and dismiss or put on hold the lawsuit he filed - through a Notice of Settlement filed with the court. If you are willing to pay the fees/time necessary to try that, feel free to contact me.
You also could contact the State Bar of California and/or the local county Bar Association in his county, and request their help in resolving this, based upon the issues you raised about interest charges. The local Bar Association has 'fee dispute' resolution authority over him. That might work.
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