Legal Question in Civil Litigation in New Jersey

Hello. Wow, this is a tough situtation. I will try to answer your questions with the information you have provided. However, you will probably need to provide alot more information in order to get complete answers to your questions.

First, you ask if you "would be able to sue a family member". The answer to that is, "Yes." As long as you have a valid legal claim, you can bring this person to court.

Second, there was some form of agreement between you and your Aunt as follows. You would put money into an account but you could only access the account to withdraw money at the time you "had a good amount". You trusted your Aunt to take care of this for you so that you would not spend the money like you had done once before when you were younger. Your Aunt failed you in this OR, per her boyfriend, someone ran off with the money.

The questions are: Do you know the bank where the money was being held? Do you even know if anyone put it in the bank? If it was, whose name is or was on the account? Was it a joint account allowing you to have access to it as well as someone else - your Aunt? If it was a joint account, you have a right to obtain all the records about the account. You will need to show them identification - as in valid, current photo identification. Did you keep any records of the amounts you deposited? Did you keep the deposit slips?

How was this agreement made? Did you have anything put down in writing? Did anyone else know about this agreement that could corroborate your story? The more proof you have that there was an agreement and what the terms of the agreement were, the more likely you will be able to get the money back or have your Aunt held responsible for the loss to you.

How much money are we talking about here? How important is it to maintain a relationship with your Aunt? How will trying to collect the money by a lawsuit effect you and other people in your family? The reason I ask these questions is that it may not be worth it for you to bother if the amount of money is not that great. If it was alot of money and you have proof of what you put in and that there was an agreement, you may want to go to the local police station where you or your Aunt live and discuss this with a detective there. You may wish to file charges against your Aunt and have the prosecutor represent you and get compensated that way. However, you may not want to get your Aunt in trouble this way. In addition, sometimes the police do not want to get involved in what they may consider a "civil matter". This may be theft, though. It is certainly worth discussing with the police.

If you think you have enough proof of the agreement and the amount you deposited, you may want to go to the courthouse in the county where you live and file a complaint against your Aunt. Depending upon the amount of money at stake, you would file your complaint in the Law Division - Special Civil Part or the Law Division - Civil Part. Special Civil part is more like small claims court any many persons there represent themselves. It costs less to file a complaint in the Special Civil part than in the Civil Part.

I hope my answer has been helpful to you. If you can provide more information in a follow up question, that would be helpful. Regards, Tina Nielsen Amodeo