Legal Question in Administrative Law in North Carolina

What is the court of claims?

In NC - the state court is the general court of justice. It has 3 divisions - small claims, district court and superior court.

There is a business court for business issues as well as appeals courts consisting of the court of appeals and the Supreme Court.

For federal cases, there are the United States District Courts of which there are 3 (eastern, middle and western) in NC. There are also other courts for special things (Social Security, VA benefits, Immigration, bankruptcy and so on). So there may be some kind of federal claims court but I am not a litigator and do not practice in these areas so I am not familiar with it.

A complaint is what is filed to commence a legal action (along with a summons). It is a document directed to the defendant in a case and complains (hence the word complaint) that the defendant has harmed or caused some kind of injury (could be bodily injury or it could be damage to property or just a loss of money) and should be made to pay the plaintiff for the injury. The complaint usually identifies the parties, explains why the court can hear the case, sets forth enough facts to clue the defendant as to what this matter is about and asks for relief.

See NC Gen. Stat. � 1A-1, Rule 84. It provides some very simple sample complaints and answers; you can access at the link below:

http://www.ncleg.net/EnactedLegislation/Statutes/HTML/BySection/Chapter_1A/GS_1A-1,_Rule_84.html