Really Irritated, Part II

I didn't mean to do this in parts. When I started to post last night, I stopped because I had something to do. I have been chastised by OCD. :P

I did some research on the person's case to see if, based on his facts, I could do a motion to get rid of some of the back child support, either completely or partially. I found some good case law, and I told the client that I believed that I could help him. He owed almost $100,000 at this point.

I drafted the documents, and filed them. I think the problem arose when we were taking too long to get the documents filed. He had only retained us about 3 months prior to the filing before we finally filed them, which might be too long in a lot of family law cases, but in his case, since there was nothing drastic pending, there was no rush.

However, all of a sudden, just after we sent the documents to be filed, we received a message from the client demanding that we cease all work on his case, that he had obtained new counsel.

The new attorney telephoned me to find out what we had filed, and why. I explained it to him. He was kind of hazy.

A month or two after that, the new attorney demanded that I refund the entire amount of the fees that the client had paid to me, claiming that I should have known that there was NO WAY that I could be successful on this case. However, at the point where the client had demanded that we stop working on his case, we had expended well over the retainer he had paid to us, and all that was left was to make the appearance. We weren't going to charge any more, just to be nice. There was no way I was going to give him any money back.

I told the attorney that I have often had success on my cases, even in cases where other attorneys had said, "It can't be done!" We argued, he was condescending, I hung up on him. He seemed like one of those asshole types of attorneys who makes a problem worse rather than better.

When clients have come to see me because they are disgruntled with their original attorney, if it sounds like the problem can be worked out, I usually recommend that they stay with their attorney.

Not only did this new attorney not try to help get this worked out, if in fact my client thought I had dragged my feet too long in getting the motion filed, he made it worse.

The new attorney didn't even bother to leave the matter on calendar. He caused it to be dismissed, as in telling the court to take it off calendar.

If I was that attorney, if I really wanted to prove my point that "it couldn't be done," I would have let the motion go forward and be denied, and then I would have gone to the old attorney (me) and said, "You fool! You should have known it couldn't be done! Give my client back his money!"

When I finally spoke with the client yesterday, I told him that I still believed it could be done, based on the research that I had done. He disagreed. He told me that his attorney only needed to do 15 minutes of research to figure out that it absolutely could not be done, and he might as well keep paying on the $100K that he owed, please give him back his money, plus interest, thank you very much.

I told him that I was so confident that I would win the motion that, if he let me refile it and it lost, I would give him back his money.

Think about what a "win/win" situation this would be for him! He had already paid. All the documents had already been drafted. If I lost, I would give him his retainer back. If I won, he would see a substantial reduction of his child support by about $50,000.00.

First, though, he told me that the new attorney didn't have anything to win by requesting my client's money back, that they were "friends" before my client even realized that the new attorney was an attorney! That sounded very odd to me.

Then, he told me that no, he would just rather have his money back because he didn't believe it could be done. I told him to go ahead and file a complaint with the state bar because I believed I hadn't done anything wrong.

Here's what's interesting to me:

Why not let the motion be heard??? It was already drafted and filed. The major bulk of the work had been done. What if the motion was granted? What does he have to lose except the court denies the motion and I give him back the money he initially paid me??? I wasn't going to charge him any more money, and I was even going to give back to him the entire amount of the retainer if the judge denied the motion!

Even more interesting is that the new attorney and the client turned out to be friends! It struck me that they were trying to scam me. Think about it: They dismiss the action before it can be heard and threaten to report me to the state bar if I don't refund the money. Then, they can later refile all the documents that I had already drafted, but file the documents under the new attorney's name, and all the work I had done would be free for him to use.

Another interesting fact: The alleged "malpractice" that should require that I give my client back his money occurred about 7 or 8 months ago. Why haven't they reported this to the state bar by now, regardless of whether I gave the client back his money or not?

If I had retained an attorney who had taken money to do something that couldn't be done, I wouldn't wait this long to try to get my money back. I would have immediately reported the attorney to the state bar. This is not about a "fee dispute" over which the state bar has no jurisdiction. This would absolutely be malpractice because I took money with the promise that I would do something that couldn't be done!

So, I'm really irritated. This is the 3rd bullshit accusation I've had to defend myself against this past 9 months. I won the first 2 accusations, one being a charge-back, and one a complaint with the state bar.

I still have a pending civil action that was filed against me by the nut who claims that, but for me, she wouldn't have had to plead guilty to felony child abuse, lol. Jeez. I found out from my attorney, btw, that she didn't appear at the case management conference that was scheduled yesterday. So my attorney set a trial date.

Something else that came up with regard to that case that's funny: (Okay, you probably have to be an attorney to find this funny. If you need somthing to read to put you to sleep, keep reading.)

In October of last year, my attorney served form interrogatories on her, but he forgot to attach a proof of service. This is no big deal. I'm not worried. Law is rife with opportunity to make a mistake, but the good thing is that mistakes can be fixed. Sometimes, though, mistakes can cause something good to happen, as in this case, hehe.

The Plaintiff (who is suing me) responded to the form interrogatories with objections to every single form interrogatory. She refused to answer any of the form interrogatories on the grounds that a proof of service hadn't been attached to the form interrogatories. Okay, fine.

My attorney said that we could send other discovery to her, and ask the questions listed on the form interrogatories at a deposition, rather than re-serve them.

My attorney mailed to the Plaintiff two types of discovery: Special Interrogatories and Request for Production of Documents.

In a limited civil case, as opposed to an unlimited civil case, you can only served a total of 35 requests for documents, special interrogatories, and requests for admissions. In an unlimited case, you can send 35 of each. However, in either type of case, the number of form interrogatories don't count.

The other day, the Plaintiff sent responses to the Special Interrogatories and the Request for Production of Documents. In those responses, she didn't answer a single question! Instead, she objected on the grounds that I had already propounded 48 FORM INTERROGATORIES (to which she had objected!) and therefore didn't have to answer the Special Interrogatories and the Request for Production of Documents because the total was more than 35! LOL!!!!

Um, you probably don't understand why "LOL". My attorney only served a total of 34 Interrogatories and Request for Production of Documents. The number of Form Interrogatories doesn't matter.

Now, because she didn't timely answer any of the questions, she can't object to any of them. She might have been able to object on the grounds of privacy, or privilege, or a number of things. My attorney had even asked for the name and address of her doctor who has been treating her for her "mental distress", to which she probably could have objected (even though we would have overcome the objection, but she could have made more work for us if she really wanted to screw with us), but now she can't object because she erred in objecting to the recent requests because she doesn't understand the law. Woohoo!

Um, okay. You probably aren't laughing because you're not an attorney, not because this is really boring and you don't know why I'm so amused.

What a dumb youknowwhat. Um, not you, her. The plaintiff.

p.s. I had to come back and edit because I went and read the first post on why I'm irritated, and I realized that I said therein, "It might be the physical." I need to explain that. Stay tuned for part III. (Sorry OCD!)