My wife and I are retired and disabled. We went to an elder attorney to create a will and trust. At the second meeting , there was only a will , I asked where the trust was, he said it is embedded in the will. He demanded $5000 up front , cashiers check only, no credit cards or personal checks. I called him back 17 times and he would not answer. A year and half later, I knew I had been cheated. I went to another lawyer and she said the so called trust was invalid and spent 5.5 hours with us and created a trust, all for $2300. I want to take him to small claims court. His office is only 25 minutes away, that is where he cheated me and that's where the court is. The court website says usually they try the case where the defendant lives, but he lives 2 hours away on the Georgia State line. My wife can never make the trip and she is my witness . I called the court and they could not answer my question. Can I have the trial in the town that his office is in? Can we claim hardship ? Shouldn't the trial be held where the crime took place . His home town is corrupt as hell.
1 Answer from Attorneys
The location of a case is dictated by the state constitution and isn't changed for convenience. .You must file in the county where the attorney lived if he is a sole proprietorship, or, if he was incorporated, in the county where the registered agent is (or in some cases where the office is). Regardless, it happens in the designated location for the court in that county in 158 of Georgia's 159 counties (Fulton uses multiple cities). Small claims court is probably the wrongchoice for a fee dispute. You can use the state bar fee arbitration, which has considerable flexibility and success (and keeps youout of that court system in most cases) . . $5000 is way too steep for almost any will, and very few people need a separate trust (andif theyneed one, usually a trustwithin a will is fine for most people. In fact $2300 is steep too. $500 to $1000, absent anything complex, would cover what most couples need.
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