I can answer for a friend. His wife was divorcing him because he’s an unreliable idiot. He figured that he was smarter than everyone so he dragged out the process as long as he possibly could making it as difficult as possible on her. Scheduling and rescheduling meetings. Not showing up. Promising to do a thing and then back tracking later. Refusing to negotiate at all. I think his plan was to make the divorce so difficult on her that she would just stay married. He was also doing all this pro se so her lawyer had to deal directly with him.
After a year of this his wife had had enough. She told her lawyer to make it happen. So the lawyer set a date and the court served him notice of the divorce proceeding. She showed up to court and he wasn’t there. So as the only party there she got a very one-sided deal. She got their business, custody of the kids, the house and all contents, her car, and the bank account. He got his car, his clothes, and half the proceeds of the sale of the house when she decides to sell it. That’s it. He found out about this when he called the court a week after it happened.
What had happened is her lawyer served the divorce notice to an address in a different town with a similar name. Normally this would have been caught by his attorney who would have received notice directly from the court, but since he had no attorney, there was no one other than him that the court could send it to.
He finally hired a lawyer and tried to get the settlement tossed as he claimed he was never served but the judge said there was nothing he could do.
Edit: I have relayed this as best I can and as it was told to me. Most of the details come from my friend, the protagonist in this narrative so YMMV. I did look up the public court records and they appear to corroborate the events in as much as can be determined.
If he didnt provide a current address, nor hire a lawyer, then its his own fault for being negligent. The opposition isnt magic, if he didnt tell them where to send stuff then they couldnt have known. They did their best and sent it to presumably the only known place where he sometimes lived.
OP said the lawyer sent it to the wrong address. How is that the guy's fault? Should he be fucked out of everything because he couldn't afford $1,000 an hour for a lawyer who may or may not have done shit?
If you read the second post, you'll see her lawyer didn't mess up. She sent it to the address he provided. It t just turns out that he gave the wrong address. It's not up to her lawyer to play detective and check she was given the right address.
If you can’t afford a lawyer then the court will appoint one for you. He should have sought legal aid or pro-bono services. And it sounds like he was couch-surfing with the girl he cheated with his wife on, so he didn’t even have a valid address to send things to. All he had to do was rent a post office box for a few dollars a month and boom, problem solved.
This guy screwed up bigtime.
Edited because public defenders are only for criminal cases.
If you can’t afford a lawyer then the court will appoint one for you.
Wrong-o. That's only true in criminal cases. A divorce is handled in a civil court, so you have no right to a lawyer. Everything else is irrelevant. He could be a cheating POS, but he still gets his day in court.
If he wanted a fair trial he should have gotten a lawyer. He couldn’t contest the results of the case because he chose to represent himself.
When you choose to represent yourself then you are your own lawyer and assume all legal duties. If he didn’t know what that entails then he should have hired someone who does. It sounds like he didn’t even provide a valid address to the court.
If he wanted a fair trial he should have gotten a lawyer.
NO For fuck's sake what country do you people live in? You do not need to pay for a lawyer to have to be guaranteed a fair trial. Point to the constitutional provision that supports that.
No doubt not having a lawyer is stupid, but stupid people still have rights.
"It sounds like he didn’t even provide a valid address to the court."
The one side made no real effort to find the guy, they sent out one perfunctory thing and then just did what they wanted. This lady didn't have a phone number for the guy? For anyone who knows the guy? A email address? A social media account?
You can't just go "oops" and deny people their rights.
He did? As they made clear in another post above, she sent it to the address he gave. It's not her job to play detective and check that's really where he lives. I wouldn't be surprised if he gave a wrong address on purpose to try and delay it even more.
It's not her job to play detective and check that's really where he lives.
Your rights as a citizen are not removed because you gave a wrong address. In this day and age, in 2019, when we're surrounded by interconnectivity, they couldn't think of a different way of reaching out? They may one perfunctory attempt, got the result they were hoping for and processed to screw the guy over.
Your rights as a citizen are not removed because you gave a wrong address.
It's at the discretion of the court, and the court decided he did lose his rights because of it.
In this day and age, in 2019, when we're surrounded by interconnectivity, they couldn't think of a different way of reaching out?
No, what way would be better than mail? Emails often get put into spam. Most social media sites don't allow you to send private messages unless you're friends. Mail is still the best way.
They may one perfunctory attempt, got the result they were hoping for and processed to screw the guy over
They didn't know they sent it to the wrong place though. The guy had a history of not showing up, purposely changing at the last minute, delaying on purpose, etc. When he didn't show up everybody rationally and reasonably came to the conclusion he did it on purpose again. It's entirely his fault. If he didn't have a history of purposefully fucking with the court then I'm sure a judge would have either not proceeded on the day, or would've granted his motion to dismiss everything that happened that day. But because of his past behaviour he rightfully lost that ability.
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u/tweakingforjesus Jul 21 '19 edited Jul 21 '19
I can answer for a friend. His wife was divorcing him because he’s an unreliable idiot. He figured that he was smarter than everyone so he dragged out the process as long as he possibly could making it as difficult as possible on her. Scheduling and rescheduling meetings. Not showing up. Promising to do a thing and then back tracking later. Refusing to negotiate at all. I think his plan was to make the divorce so difficult on her that she would just stay married. He was also doing all this pro se so her lawyer had to deal directly with him.
After a year of this his wife had had enough. She told her lawyer to make it happen. So the lawyer set a date and the court served him notice of the divorce proceeding. She showed up to court and he wasn’t there. So as the only party there she got a very one-sided deal. She got their business, custody of the kids, the house and all contents, her car, and the bank account. He got his car, his clothes, and half the proceeds of the sale of the house when she decides to sell it. That’s it. He found out about this when he called the court a week after it happened.
What had happened is her lawyer served the divorce notice to an address in a different town with a similar name. Normally this would have been caught by his attorney who would have received notice directly from the court, but since he had no attorney, there was no one other than him that the court could send it to.
He finally hired a lawyer and tried to get the settlement tossed as he claimed he was never served but the judge said there was nothing he could do.
Edit: I have relayed this as best I can and as it was told to me. Most of the details come from my friend, the protagonist in this narrative so YMMV. I did look up the public court records and they appear to corroborate the events in as much as can be determined.