fell off a chair (Brewster: cost, litigation, legal)
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
If you really think an attorney has to prove that they sent out correspondence you are seriously deluding yourself. If they did, they would never make any money. You are basically saying that attorneys, who are officers of the court, go around lying to clients, judges, and insurance companies on a regular basis. Seriously. I have never heard "I never got your letter" used as a valid excuse, and I've never gotten a certified letter from an attorney in the 20 years I handled claims.
No need to scratch your chin. You are wrong, and should probably stick to giving advice on things you are familiar with.
OP good luck if you listen to this advice. It's only your house at stake.
I must say I am getting a good chuckle at all the quasi legal terms and advice being bandied about here, LOL.
20 years you handled claims? What...you worked in insurance? That just tells me you can chew gum and tie your shoes at the same time. With those skills, in this market, it's a wonder you left NY
Lookit: Get a letter. Ignore it. Maybe the other party pursues this further. Maybe they don't. At least they know you aren't stupid enough to run and jump and tell your insurance company that SOMETHING HAPPENED...which establishes a case.
Let's say your insurance company calls you on this (highly unlikely). You say, yes, this person was in my house x months ago but nothing happened. WTF..or, you say you never heard of this person before. Or, you say a fat guy in a red suit dropped toys in your fireplace...see where this is going? The plaintiff's claim is ludicrous.
Now the insurance company has a client that denies knowledge of the incident and an attorney on a fishing expedition. What do they do? WHO CARES? You're done unless they seriously think they're going to get you in a courtroom. Something that has far less of a chance of happening if you nip this in the bud and ignore it. The J.O. attorney will have to weigh whether or not to pursue since you were unmoved by his first attempt to contact you. Forget the fact that they have no case to begin with. She'd have had OP dead to right if she went to the hospital via ambulance from OP's house and I bet that's the first thing J.O. attorney told her.
People like you who scream "how high" when told to jump, make frivolous, rate-increasing lawsuits like this possible.
Mine was the best advice given and I have proven it twice.
Glad I could brighten others' days with a chuckle too...
Last edited by Monty Brewster; 11-19-2012 at 04:38 PM..
If you really think an attorney has to prove that they sent out correspondence you are seriously deluding yourself. If they did, they would never make any money. You are basically saying that attorneys, who are officers of the court, go around lying to clients, judges, and insurance companies on a regular basis. Seriously. I have never heard "I never got your letter" used as a valid excuse, and I've never gotten a certified letter from an attorney in the 20 years I handled claims.
No need to scratch your chin. You are wrong, and should probably stick to giving advice on things you are familiar with.
OP good luck if you listen to this advice. It's only your house at stake.
I must say I am getting a good chuckle at all the quasi legal terms and advice being bandied about here, LOL.
If attorneys, or anyone else, don't have to prove they sent a letter.....what is the point of sending something "certified mail"?
Which brings up something else that always made me wonder. Couldn't someone just send an empty envelope, certified, and claim it contained legal notice? Double .
I had a real estate agent over my house as I am thinking about selling. We are (my wife and I and the real estate agent) are sitting at the table. About ten minutes later the chair upon which the real estate agent was sitting collapsed and broke. Yesterday, i received a letter from a lawyer saying that the real estate agent is suing for injuries. At the time I asked her if she wanted an ambulance, she said no she was fine. I've called my insurance agent. Is this what we are becoming????
Did she get your insurance information? Was an accident report filed? I wouldn't have said anything to the insurance company unless there was an accident report. Can just imagine how that woulda went lol
I believe this to be correct. They rely solely on clueless people to make a living. In more ways than one.
I also agree with this. As a self employed person, they are exempt from collection workers comp. So maybe this is the only way they have to get some dough.
It's irrelevant whether they send a letter. You can sue anyone for anything at any time, within the statute of limitations which for a personal injury action is three years. The attorney doesn't have to send you a letter first, or contact you in any way. They may try to do so in order to scare a quick settlement out of you, or they may because they want you to contact your insurance company (which is what you should be doing). But the fact remains, if they want to sue you, they can just go ahead and do it.
Here's how the legal system works - I make a claim, you deny it, then it's up to a jury to determine who is telling the truth and who is lying. Before you get to that point, you'll need to expend possibly several years conducting discovery, meaning the exchange of documents, depositions, etc. During that time you'll need legal representation, which will be provided to you at no cost by your homeowners insurance company, or you can pay out of pocket to the tune of $30,000-$50,000 or more depending on the length and complexity of the case.
Worst case scenario, this woman has a long history of back problems or some crap that a doctor is willing to say is a result of this accident. She's a great witness, and you get a bad jury. Do you want to risk it?
You have literally nothing to lose by notifying your insurance company. They are not going to raise your rates or something just because you tell them something happened. If you lie to them, or don't tell them about it, however, you run the risk of them disclaiming coverage, leaving you on the hook paying for your attorney as well as any judgment.
It's irrelevant whether they send a letter. You can sue anyone for anything at any time, within the statute of limitations which for a personal injury action is three years. The attorney doesn't have to send you a letter first, or contact you in any way. They may try to do so in order to scare a quick settlement out of you, or they may because they want you to contact your insurance company (which is what you should be doing). But the fact remains, if they want to sue you, they can just go ahead and do it.
Here's how the legal system works - I make a claim, you deny it, then it's up to a jury to determine who is telling the truth and who is lying. Before you get to that point, you'll need to expend possibly several years conducting discovery, meaning the exchange of documents, depositions, etc. During that time you'll need legal representation, which will be provided to you at no cost by your homeowners insurance company, or you can pay out of pocket to the tune of $30,000-$50,000 or more depending on the length and complexity of the case.
Worst case scenario, this woman has a long history of back problems or some crap that a doctor is willing to say is a result of this accident. She's a great witness, and you get a bad jury. Do you want to risk it?
You have literally nothing to lose by notifying your insurance company. They are not going to raise your rates or something just because you tell them something happened. If you lie to them, or don't tell them about it, however, you run the risk of them disclaiming coverage, leaving you on the hook paying for your attorney as well as any judgment.
I'm suing you.
See how dopey that sounds?
It's not that easy. The case has to have some validity to get off the ground. A lawyer is not going to waste his time with something that he doesn't have a snowball's chance in hell of winning. Here's what I think happened.
RE Agent (to attorney who is most likely a friend, moron, or both): I fell off a chair. Can I sue?
Lawyer: Did you go to the hospital from the person's house?
Agent: No
Lawyer: Well, this will be tricky. Let me look into it.
Attorney writes letter. At this point, all he has is the plaintiff's claim that she fell in the OP's house. The OP has no relationship with the plaintiff whatsoever. They only met once. If the OP responds, she acknowledges that something happened. If the OP tells her insurance, they may tell her the same thing I'm saying. Why take the bait? Or they may respond to it, since the OP has acknowledged that something happened. The OP's rates may go up, or they may drop her altogether, because of this BS. She may have to waste additional time and money on counsel and stress herself out, for what? Once that lady walked out of the OP's house, game over.
You ignore the letter, now what? What proof does this lady have? Nothing! The only thing she could possibly have that would even come close to substantiating her claim, would be a response to that letter, which is what the attorney is fishing for, to establish a case. This is a very common tactic. And you think I'm dense? When that letter doesn't receive a response, the lawyer has to weigh whether or not he has enough of a case to proceed.
In theory, it might seem like the safe way to go, but all it does is allow this crap to continue. I would ignore it. I have ignored it. So you may know or think you know how the legal system works, but it didn't work that way for me in not one but two similar instances.
The burden of proof is on the accuser. The lawyer doesn't have an accident report or ambulance report, as one would in a car accident, or if the agent had gone that route. He has oogotz. This case is a waste of everyone's time and, absent any substance, a judge would toss it in a preliminary hearing before it got anywhere near a jury (LMAO). With no acknowledgement whatsoever from the alleged defendant, he had better have something significant to proceed. Any attorney worth his salt knows this. That's why he sent the letter, hoping for a response. If the letter was sent certified, the lawyer could at the very least tell a judge the defendant is unresponsive, and that would probably allow the case to proceed. The letter wasn't sent certified, probably because it's such a POS case, so ignore it and you have a good shot at putting this to bed.
Last edited by Monty Brewster; 11-20-2012 at 01:56 AM..
All of your bluster, even if true, simply detracts from the credibility of her case, it does not render it unwinnable. People file 100% false claims all the time, you think this instance, where she actually did fall at the OP's house, is going to be "thrown out in a preliminary hearing" (as if there is such a thing as a "preliminary hearing" in state court, or that judges "throw cases out" on their on volition)? If there is a good injury (history of back problems + shady doctor = good injury), and/or this agent would make a good witness, believe you me there are people willing to take the case regardless of how much you try to amateur stonewall.
You have no clue how the legal system works and I'm going to leave it at that because I'm rather tired of trying to educate you. As I said from my first post, the OP should inform her homeowner's insurance and follow their instructions, there is literally no downside to doing so.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
