Legal Question in Civil Litigation in Iowa

Re: court

What you should do IMMEDIATELY is contact your OWN INSURANCE COMPANY, and LET THEM DEAL WITH IT. You are not in any position to make decisions about this, and your insurer will hire a lawyer to defend you. But YOU should take NO steps at this time to contact anyone but your own insurer, and I suggest you put it in writing and FAX it to them, AND call them immediately, just to be safe. You do have an obligation to your insurer, by contract, not to do anything that might prejudice the insurer's ability to defend the case. If you don't, they COULD withdraw coverage for this accident, which you would ordinarily NOT want to happen. In other words, let THEM decide whether to contact the other party or their lawyer, or to instead just let them try to find you and serve you. I don't know enough about your situation to advise you which route your insurance company or their lawyer may wish to take. The precise answer as to how it is dealt if they DON'T serve you, THIS will depend heavily on state law in the state you were sued in.

To answer some of your other questions, your own insurance should cover you wherever you drive within the 50 states -- and I think Canada as well -- so long as you're insured with them. If you've MOVED and didn't TELL them you did, then there COULD be a problem, particularly if the move was BEFORE this accident. I presume you've already reported the accident to your insurance company, and I don't know if you have any residency policy issues.

Normally, if you are first SERVED properly with a true copy of the summons and complaint (the complaint is the lawsuit) and THEN fail to appear, the opposing party may be able to indeed get a default judgment against you for what they're suing you for, or something less. This default judgment is what you were referring to as being "automatically found guilty" if you don't appear. The term "guilty" is ordinarily reserved for criminal proceedings, not a civil lawsuit. Here in Oregon, defaults are governed in part by a simple hearing, to prove to the judge the allegations for money damages contained in the complaint. Having said that, default judgments ARE in SOME states easy to overturn, but I would not rely on that.

You should also know that some states may well allow a default judgment against you, even if you were NOT served at all. Again, this is a pretty technical issue that varies from one state to another.

Good luck! ...and call your insurer and TELL THEM what you heard!

-- Sam

Re: court

Proceed carefully. You may want to have someone file a notice of appearance precisely to challenge jurisdiction based on lack of service of process. This is a fairly common occurrence and there is a lot of caselaw on the subject.

You need to contact your insurance company. This is why you carry insurance; so that in the event you are sued because of an auto accident, you have a lawyer standing by. You need to go see that person and explain very carefully to them why you think that you have not been served.

You can keep track of the lawsuit by going to the courthouse and looking up the file. It is public record.

You are correct that you have to be personally served, but if you are concealing yourself or hiding to avoid service, they will eventually get an order allowing service by publication and you are going to be subject to the jurisdiction of the court. Please call your insurance company and lawyer up. Powell