Must I pay counter claim award if less than original claim award? I won a claim in small claims for $2405. The defendant submitted a counter-claim and won $205. I received two separate letters in the mail, one for each claim. Must I send the $205 to her for the counter-claim regardless of whether she pays the $2405? If she owes me money, why would I pay her? Information for the jurisdiction of San Francisco, California is most desirable.
You can offset the amount but you must go to court to do it. The court can then grant you an offset. This document from a law office describes the details. The risk you run if you do not pay and do not do this properly is that she, with a valid judgement in her hand, can take enforcement action including garnishee of bank accounts and seizure of property (of course, you can do the same to her).
Yes Assuming you were assaulted (with or without battery) and you suffered injury (physical or otherwise) during that assault you are entitled to damages. The injury has to flow from the assault but not necessarily from the assaulter. For example, if you fled across the road and were struck by a car you could sue your attacker. Because assault is an intentional tort, it is not necessary for you to prove that actual financial loss was suffered - this is not negligence. The court can assess economic loss, non-economic loss and exemplary (punitive) damages.
Can I sue someone for publicly calling me a sex offender if I'm not one? Yes. However, in this particular case you need to take a preliminary step regardless of your jurisdiction, which I assume is somewhere in the U.S. Prior to filing any complaint (and I will repeat this below), it is in your best interest that you demand a retraction and removal of the defamatory falsehood. Be sure to show the prospective defendant(s) some proof that supports your pre-suit demand. You need to secure your ability to prove in court that you made that demand. For that reason, your requests should be in writing (email, and certified mail if practicable). If it is not by email, you should have the addressee at least sign a receipt copy of your demand letter. A demand of retraction is prerequisite in jurisdictions such as Texas and Florida. If you [or your lawyer] omit that step, the court will easily dismiss your complaint altogether. In other jurisdictions, such as Michigan, the request of retraction is a requirement only if you intend to pursue exemplary and punitive damages. See MCL 600.2911(2)(b). Regardless of the jurisdiction, your request or demand to each prospective defendant needs to be made prior to filing the corresponding complaint/pleadings in court. Even if your jurisdiction does not have that prerequisite, failing to request a retraction and removal of the defamatory falsehoods would allow the defendant to justify itself and/or obtain leniency on the basis that it was not aware that the registry information turned out to be disproved/inaccurate. In your complaint(s), you will pursue injunctive relief that consists of ordering the removal [from each website or post] of the defamatory falsehoods. It is also reasonable for you to also ask for monetary relief. You certainly have a claim of defamation per se, but a ruling granting you an award of substantive damages is doubtful unless the defendant refuses --or neglects-- to remove the inaccurate records. If the website owners/authors promptly remove the false records, it is going to be difficult or impossible to prove actual malice: that is, that they published the falsehoods (1) despite knowing them to be false, or (2) with reckless disregard of their truth. Without the ability to prove actual malice or that you suffered special damages (whether it is a loss of employment or other economic damages), the court would only grant you nominal damages, which is the negligible amount of one dollar. Lastly, beware that even the granting of injunctive relief might be ineffective. I [vaguely] recall a case where federal court ordered a removal from sex offender registry, but apparently the defendant ignored the order. I have no idea how much the plaintiff's lawyer charged him for the futile representation, but the last time I checked neither the problem was fixed nor did it appear that the attorney pushed any further to ensure compliance with the order. I will not disclose the name of the lawyer, since that would facilitate the unintended consequence of identifying the defamed plaintiff.
Suing relatives or friends to trigger an insurance policy is sometimes necessary, particularly if the insurer is being recalcitrant. Apart from that it is pointless to sue someone who has no money! In common law jurisdictions you can of course sue anyone for negligence. One of the things that you have to prove to be successful is that the defendant owed a duty of care. It may be difficult to prove that a child had such a duty.
In California, the small claims court has jurisdiction over claims up to $10,000. In order to have personal jurisdiction over him: He must have a summons and complaint hand delivered to him (or to certain other people such as an adult who lives in his household, or to his secretary if he has one). This is called "service of process" and there are professionals called "process servers" who can do this for you in most cities. The service of process can take place anywhere in the world and still be valid. The summons and complaint must be hand delivered by a person over the age of eighteen who is not a party to the lawsuit and is not your attorney. The events that form the basis of the lawsuit must have happened in California, not merely the United States (long arm personal jurisdiction), or he must have the summons and complaint personally hand delivered to him in the State of California (tag jurisdiction). If you win, either by default if he fails to respond by the deadline, or following a trial, you will get a piece of paper called a judgment that legally determines that he owes you $X, which you must then enforce. A judgment can be enforced, for example, by garnishing his bank accounts, garnishing monies due to him from an employer or from a sole proprietorship he operates, seizing tangible personal property that he owns with the assistance of a sheriff, or putting a lien on real estate he owns. A judgment from a California small claims court can only be enforced against assets in California. There is a relatively simple process for having a judgment from California turned into a judgment from any other U.S. state. There is a relatively difficult and expensive process for having a judgment from California turned into a judgment from England that only sometimes works because some aspects of the U.S. civil court system (like punitive damages) are considered to be against public policy in England and are thus not enforceable there. You cannot have someone arrested for failure to pay a civil judgment. Enforcing the judgment is likely to be much more difficult than getting the judgment in your case. It is also possible to make a criminal complaint if the acts genuinely constitute theft. If a prosecutor finds that there is probable cause to back up your claim, the prosecutor could obtain an arrest warrant from the court in the place where the theft took place and that could be served within California when the individual is present in California (i.e., he could be arrested in California, after which the criminal justice process would proceed). Generally, to constitute theft, it must be intentional and must not be a mere breach of an agreement, in which case it is a breach of contract rather than theft. Any theft small enough to be addressed in small claims court would probably not be considered serious enough for the government to request extradition from the U.K. for, a step usually reserved for serious felonies, but if extradiction was sought from the U.K., the process on the U.K. side is described here. Any extradiction request would be handled by the prosecutor's office and law enforcement, in cooperation with federal law enforcement agencies.
If you paid by a credit card, the proper procedure is to simply do a chargeback. If the hotel doesn't back down, then the credit card network will hold arbitration. I wouldn't expect them to win, since they don't have anything but their word for it. The hotel does have the option of suing you, but it's unlikely that they will do so for £200, and again they don't have much of a case. Their third option is to just report it to credit reporting agencies as a unpaid debt. For this, there's not much you can do other than have the fact that you dispute it included in your file. Theoretically, you could sue them for defamation, but that would be impractical.
You reach a settlement instead of a judge deciding a court case if both sides agree that a settlement is better for them than paying court costs, lawyers cost, the risk of losing, having embarrassing details published, distraction for a business, waste of time, and the stress of a court case. If the plaintiff wants to be able to publish details of the case, there is a lot less reason for the defendant to enter a settlement agreement. You complain that third parties miss out on possible information. That’s exactly why it isn’t there, because the defendant doesn’t want it to be there. The defendant might offer “I’ll give you $ 1,000 if you agree not to say a word about the case.” If the plaintiff says “I want $ 1,000 and tell the world about what happened”, then the defendant will likely say “take our offer, or take us to court and our lawyers will do their best so you get nothing”. The defendant will just not offer the kind of settlement you are looking for. And the plaintiff will do what is best for them, not what is best for anyone else. You have to remember that a settlement cannot be forced upon both sides, it must be something that both sides agree on. It's easiest to agree if you give the other side what they want if it doesn't cost you much, and then get things that you value more in return. As a plaintiff, not telling the world about the case is something that costs me nothing, but may have high value for the defendent. On the other hand, I value cash from the defendent a lot, while the defendent may be rich and can easily afford it. Because both sides have to agree, the terms are likely to incorporate something that both sides want.
Yes it is kind of possible what country would the legal action need to originate from? Would one file in the US and note the foreign defendant or would one file, as a foreigner, in the home country of the defendant? You can go either way. It is not obtaining the judgment that is the biggest trouble here, but enforcing it. You will need: A UK mailing address. Services like ScanMyPost will suffice. Some money to pay the court fees. Time, tenacity and patience to follow through the procedure and fill all necessary forms. Be lucky in that the defendant actually has something to pay the debt with. There are two stages: Obtain a court judgment in your favour. Unless the defendant pays you, enforce the judgment. Obtaining court judgment in the UK In the UK, the "small claims court" functions are executed by HM Courts &amp; Tribunals Service. The specific service is called "Claim for money" which can be filed online via their old or new system. So, basically, you file the online form, pay the fee by credit card and wait for defendant's response. If they do not respond, you ask the court to make a judgment (in my case it took 10 weeks from filing claim to getting judgment). If the defendant responds and defends themselves, expect much longer wait and uncertain outcome. Enforcement So, you and the defendant have both received court judgment saying that they must pay you. But they are not paying. There is a range of options you can choose from: County Court Warrant of Control (claims from £50 to £5,000). Court bailiff will go to the defendant's address and try to seize goods that can be easily sold. High Court Writ of Control (claims from £600). Attachment of earnings order (you ask the court to order the defendant's employer to deduct his earnings in your favour). Third-party debt order (a.k.a. "Garnishee Order") — if you know the defendant's bank account details. Read about potential pitfalls here. Charging order: you will only get paid if the defendant sells their land. Bankrupt the defendant (big court fees!). Alternatively, you could always hire a UK lawyer but then you would probably not need this answer.