Did You Ever Take Someone to Court?

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and win?

What is the experience like? Did you represent yourself or did you have legal counsel? Were you ever awarded damages?

No...i ALMOST took to court an artist who took a flyer I made (i have made hundreds of flyers)....represented it as his own when he submitted his portfolio to Levis....it got selected to be printed on shirts that were mass produced in korea by the Levi's company...I found out after people who were in the bands listed on the flyer happend to see the shirt at some store....Some people in bands listed on the shirt found me a lawyer....we got to the bottom of who the artist was....and it turned out that Levis had nothing ot do with it...the artist was indemnified to me...and I had used portions of clip art from a copyrighted book anyway...and therefore I was indemnified to the author of that book...and that is how my case fell apart.
the end.

I think things woulda turned out differently if I wasn't so socially akward and shy..

Am about to take on the local health authority for failing to exercise their "duty of care". Could be a biggy, [Fame at last?]... Did you know 96% of adults in the UK with Aspergers DON'T receive ANY help from our supposedly world class National Health Service. [ www.think-differently.org.uk ]

Yes, The local MH specialist solicitor, wants to take on the case [He's a young high-flyer], but there's some public funding problems, so it's probably going to have to go to a big London practice. I'm really looking forward to the fight; it's not just about me tho'. The adult services in the UK are appaling. Until recently any Aspies asking for help were rebuffed by reference to the ICD-10 handbook which says AS is of "doubtful nosological value". In otherwords, not a real disorder. It always gets dirty when lawyers are involved...

I haven't been taken to court - although I've been threatened same, and I've stood up and told them to bring it and they never did. Great example was a website who refused to delete my account after I left and they had personal information about me. The forum's superior's contacted me and accused me of defamation and threatened me. I responded curtly and invited them to take action if they felt they had a case - and they never did.

I've been on the other side though - with mixed success. I've won twice, nixing a hacker with a civil suit after he broke into my dial up account and sent false emails trying to get me into trouble, and restraining an internet stalker who was wrecking my name in another city. The second one frightened the daylights out of him let me tell you!

But I've also lost - and in one instance got bankrupted due to costs. They were punitive because all they wanted was my silence. It was to do with the Defence Department (see the military thread) and their concocted allegations that got a medical officer to rule me unfit for employment. I tried to counter charge the Department with harrassment, but it was ruled frivolous and my DX of Aspergers wasn't even recognised (they said they did, but they didn't and I know it). That - plus the fact I was representing myself against biased and experienced solicitors employed by the government didn't help.

That battle hasn't stopped though, thanks to the change of government. I'm resuming the political battle next month (pending a wretched house move!).

I've learnt a lot through all this experience though. There is more I could say, but I won't as it will get me into trouble with the mods.

But this I will say - if you are going to represent yourself, do your homework. And the first port of call should be the rules of the court you are going into. Even if the case you have is a good one, if you don't obey the rules of the court you'll lose.

My grown son who is barely on the spectrum took his exlandlord to court for lying and keeping his security deposit. My son got half of it back. For his dad and me, it was a big win because we were always too anxious to take people to court. Now we feel more confident about the process.

A little over 20 years ago I sued a negligent driver for breaking my left elbow.
I was awarded a $30,000 out of court settlement. My Lawyer got 1/3 of it as a fee.

Yeah, my girlfriend and I did this last year. We had a damp patch in the ceiling of our toilet that was getting bigger so it was obvious that our neighbor upstairs had a leak, the only problem was that he didn't care so our only option was to go to law.

The Hungarian legal system is slightly different to the UK or the USA because the judges have a lot more control. After we had given all the details to our lawyer she then prepared the legal case and then presented the papers to the court on our behalf. At this point the judge reviewed the case and decided there and then that we had a case which was worthy of legal review, if he had decided that there wasn't a case then things would have ended at this point. A lot of cases get delayed at this point because of errors in the paperwork which sometimes means that people wait years for their trial, in one case a 90 year old woman was told to come back for her next hearing in four years time because the lawyer had spelt the judges name wrong.

Three months later we had our day in court in front of a panel of three judges. They all wear suits with no wigs or gowns and the only common thing I noticed was that they were all wearing the same necktie. The lawyer expanded a little bit on the case which had been presented in the legal papers and our neighbor then had his lawyer present the other side. The judges then retired to their chambers to work out what should happen next.

The judges decided in our favor and awarded us damages which were more than enough to pay the lawyer and a builder to correct the work, but, here's where the system is REALLY different. We walked out with a bankers check for the damages that day. The court paid us the money and they then acted as a debt collector to recover the money from our neighbor. A lein was put on his apartment and unless he paid up on time his apartment would have been taken away and sold.

The end result of all this is that our ceiling has been fixed, we no longer have a damp problem, and it has not cost us a single Forint.

Ed Almos

i sued my employer once. i worked for a crappy, profit-oriented group home company. my schedule was pretty extreme and originally included 8 hours built in overtime a week. sometimes i'd be asked/told to work extra, and got a few 72 hour weeks. but the company never wanted to pay me full time-and-a-half for my overtime. each check i got they would calculate my pay in a different way. i complained to the people in charge; they avoided me for a while and eventually told me that that was the way it was going to be but if i didn't like it i didn't have to work over 40 hours a week anymore.

i spoke to a labour attorney (free initial consultation), who suggested that i sue them in small claims and told me that in unpaid overtime cases the company usually had to pay twice what was owed but not paid. i had kept copies of all of my time sheets and pay stubs, and prepared a document that showed that they owed me a bit over $2000 in unpaid overtime. when i was ready to leave that company (even with the trouble, they paid better than a lot of jobs in that area and it was a decent and interesting job - i worked there for about 7 months until i was ready to skip to a new state) i sued them in small claims for $4000 (the maximum for small claims in that state) and won easily. it took a few months to get the money from them, but the state would have seized and liquidated some of the company's property if they hadn't paid. they also had to pay all of the court costs. it was especially satisfying to subpoena the manager in the company who i'd had my discussions about my pay issues with - he didn't like that all.

another time (and another state) i was driving across the city on an interstate and there was this flatbed 18-wheeler driving erratically. he changed lanes and forced an SUV in front of me off the road onto the shoulder. i got far onto the other side of the road to pass him and my passenger flipped him off. he didn't like that, and got aggressive, chasing us and trying to push us off the road. got really close to hitting us, swinging his trailer into our lane. it took some fancy driving to avoid getting hit by just a few inches sometimes. i managed to get safely behind him. we called 911, but it was heavy traffic in a big city and the cops never got him (i called later to check). i had my passenger write down all the details on the truck - the DOT # and company name and stuff.

i called in sick to work that day because of nerves, and we decided to get even. we both went to a sketchy urgent care clinic and got benzos and muscle relaxants for our nerves, and then i wrote a letter to the truck company threatening all sorts of stuff. i did threaten 'a jury trial in small claims court' but also some stuff that trucking companies are more afraid of - bad press all over the internet and getting some anti-trucking organizations involved. i asked for a $500 settlement to cover a missed day of work and the medical bill plus general emotional distress caused by the driver. after a few weeks and a few phone calls from their legal representatives, i got a check for $500. should have asked for $1000.

3 times. Once, someone I bought an asset with and took possession of it. I got most of my investment back, as a settlement before the trial. Once, my car insurance agent. I got my money back in court. Once, an employer. I got my money before the trial.

I was taken to court once by a stupid huge car insurance company. I won and the company got a reprimand and a fine payable to me on top of it.

I find courts are good for aspies because in court you don't easily sway the law by the way you lie, how charming you are, how "in" you are, how much like everyone else you are, how much you know how to speak in cliches and say the conventional thing, etc. I've thrived in court with people I would've otherwise been a horribly defenseless victim of in any other milieu.

Society is becoming entirely too litigious for its own good. I cannot envision an circumstance under which I would take someone to court; I'd find an alternate solution.

Generally speaking, I think most lawyers should be shot on sight; they’re part of what is going to end up being the doom of us all.

Good fortune,

- Icarus loves lawyers...

Yes, it was a horrible predicament.

Never put yourself through it if you have the chance.