Are you dissatisfied with your lawyer's performance with your lawsuit? Does it appear that he's not doing enough to win the judgment you are entitled to or does it appear that he is making little or no effort to defend you?
How can you know for sure what he's doing (or not doing)? Hire another lawyer? There is an easier way.
Let us show you how easy it is to learn to use the legal system yourself, if necessary. At the very least, once you learn how the legal system works and how to use it, you will be able to discern exactly what your lawyer is doing (or not doing).
Here is how basic simple the legal system really is. First, there are only four basic areas of litigation:
- Federal
- State
- Civil
- Criminal
For the purposes of ordinary lawsuits, we can ignore federal and state criminal law. That leaves us with federal and state civil cases, in which you normally ask for money damages or injunctive relief (in the latter type of case, you are asking a judge to order someone to do something or quit doing something). We will use specific examples a little further or in this flyer.
Second, any given litigation will involve only three (3) areas:
- Facts
- Law
- Procedure
The facts are what happened. For example, if you were driving down the interstate, the cops pulled you over, and did the Rodney King Routine on you, those are facts. Facts are what happened.
The law is what you apply to the facts. When the cops dragged you out of the car and used you for a piñata, that was an unreasonable seizure in violation of the Fourth Amendment, United States Constitution.
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
If you want to make a federal case out of this incident, you sue under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, the federal civil rights statute. Looking up the law isn't difficult. 42 U.S.C. § 1983 simply means Title 42 of the United States Code, Section 1983. A federal Supreme Court case, for example, could be cited as something like Faretta v. California, 95 S.Ct. 2525 (1975), which simply means Faretta v. California, the name of the case, found in the 95th volume of the Supreme Court Reporters, page 2525, decided in (1975). This Supreme Court case held that you have a Constitutional right to act as your own lawyer.
