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An attorney and client will base a fee agreement on factors such as the lawyer's overhead and reputation, the type of legal problem, and the going rate for similar work (such as a trademark search, handling an eviction, filing bankruptcy, or preparing a living trust).
Some states avoid these problems by requiring written fee agreements (often called retainer agreements or representation agreements), and it's always a good idea.
From your point of view, a contingency fee is a good deal when the attorney must take a significant risk, but not so much when little risk is involved—unless you agree on a much lower percentage, of course. Avoid security interests.
However, you'll likely be able to find lawyers who will work for less—especially in areas with a lot of lawyers. Cheap isn't necessarily good. Although everyone wants to save money, the cheapest lawyer probably isn't the best, especially if your problem is complicated or specialized.
You want a lawyer who knows the subject matter of your legal problem inside and out, charges reasonably, treats you with respect, and with whom you can communicate. Though no lawyer is cheap, you probably can find lawyers all over the price spectrum who can meet your needs.
A lawyer in a contingency fee case might agree to front costs and get reimbursed if the client wins , but a client who loses has to pay costs back to the lawyer. Other attorneys require clients to pay these fees and costs as the case progresses. Other terms to include:
Once you file and serve your response to the creditor lawsuit, you'll receive written notification of all further proceedings in your case. Routine cases. If yours is a routine debt collection case, the next paper you will probably receive is a notice of the plaintiff's request for a trial and date.
It's difficult for someone without a lawyer to undertake them, but it's not impossible. (These descriptions are not meant to be a detailed account of how to cope with court procedures. For that, you'll want to look at Nolo's Represent Yourself in Court, by Paul Bergman and Sara Berman.)
The vast majority of cases do not go to trial. They settle or end in summary judgment or a similar proceeding. But once discovery is complete, any summary judgment motion is denied, and settlement efforts have gone nowhere, you will eventually find yourself at a trial. In a trial, a judge makes all the legal decisions, such as whether or not a particular item of evidence can be used. Either a judge or a jury makes the factual decisions, such as whether or not the item sold to you was defective.
Several states and the federal court system require that the parties come together at least once before the trial to try to settle the case. To assist you in settling, you'll be scheduled to meet with a judge or attorney who has some familiarity with the area of law your case involves. You don't have to settle, but the judge or attorney will usually give you an honest indication of your chance of winning in a trial.
Or you may be deemed to have admitted the plaintiff's assertions ("requests for admissions"). If the plaintiff (or its attorney) agrees to let you have more time to answer, get it in writing.
When someone is liable for an injury to your pet, you're probably devastated and angry. And if you're like most people, you want to be compensated for your loss. If it's only a matter of a vet bill to treat the injury, the amount of that loss should be easy to calculate. But what would be fair compensation if your pet died, ...
Laws in some states specifically entitle the owner to collect extra penalties from the person responsible for killing or hurting a service animal, as well as reimbursement for the replacement cost and other expenses required while doing without the animal's assistance. (See, for example, Nev. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 426.810.)
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In any free society, the police must be constrained. The constraint can come from a variety of sources — politics, bureaucratic culture, administrative sanctions, and so forth. It need not necessarily come from the law.
The fourth amendment has the virtue of brevity and the vice of ambiguity. It does not define the probable cause required for warrants or indicate whether a warrantless search or seizure is inevitably "unreasonable" if made without probable cause, so that the factual basis required for a constitutional search or seizure is unclear.
"Search and seizure" refers to the methods used by law enforcement to investigate crimes, track down evidence, question witnesses, and arrest suspects. It also refers to the legal rules governing these methods. At the federal level these rules are set forth in the Fourth Amendment to the U.S.
A hunt by law enforcement officials for property or communications believed to be evidence of crime, and the act of taking possession of this property.
In international law, the right of ships of war, as regulated by treaties, to examine a merchant vessel during war in order to determine whether the ship or its cargo is liable to seizure.
Search and seizure are tools used by law enforcement officers to fight crime. When a police officer investigates a murder at the scene of the crime, she searches the place. If she finds the murder weapon, she seizes it as evidence. If the police officer finds the criminal, she arrests him. An arrest is a seizure of a person.
A hunt by law enforcement officials for property or communications believed to be evidence of crime, and the act of taking possession of this property.
In certain kinds of cases, a lawyer waits until the case is over, then takes a percentage of the amount you win as a fee. If you win a big amount, the lawyer's fee climbs proportionately; if you lose, the lawyer doesn't get a fee.
If the lawyer's office uses legal assistants (trained nonlawyers who are sometimes called paralegals), you should be charged less for their time—probably about $50 to $75 per hour. The fee agreement should set out: the hourly rates of the lawyer and anyone else in the lawyer's office who might work on the case.
Even if a lawyer takes your case on a contingency fee basis (like the personal injury example), you still have to pay these costs, which can add up to several thousand dollars . The good news is that if you win your case, the judge will usually order your adversary to pay you back for these costs.
Most disputes between lawyers and clients are over money—specifically, over how much money the client owes the lawyer. To avoid these problems, some states require written fee agreements. Even if your state doesn't require one, you should get a written record of what you agreed to pay the lawyer, so everyone is clear about the agreement. ...
Flat fees. Less common is a flat fee for a particular legal task. Lawyers charge a flat fee for a matter that's essentially routine— for example, drafting a simple will or power of attorney. Flat fee services are also common for bankruptcy filings, business formation, and routine immigration services.
Some lawyers don't handle appeals or other post-trial proceedings such as judgment collection—if this is true of your lawyer, the agreement should say so. Who will do the work. The agreement should specify who will be the "lead counsel" on the case and what that lawyer will handle personally. Working together .
The lawyer agrees to help you settle your claim or file a lawsuit, in return for a handsome portion of a successful outcome. This system works well, but keep in mind that in many straightforward cases, the personal injury lawyer is paid handsomely for relatively little work, so it pays to negotiate the fee in advance.
Rent out your residential property with Nolo's bestselling book Every Landlord's Legal Guide. This all-in-one legal guide includes state-by-state legal information and key forms every savvy landlord needs to:
Ann O’Connell is a legal editor at Nolo specializing in landlord-tenant and real estate law. She writes for Nolo.com, Lawyers.com, and Avvo.
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The trick to getting awarded an expungement is having a clean background. In other words, be a first time offender, not a repeat offender. Everybody makes mistakes and judges understand that. That's why this program exists. It gives good people a second chance.
This article was co-authored by Clinton M. Sandvick, JD, PhD. Clinton M. Sandvick worked as a civil litigator in California for over 7 years. He received his JD from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1998 and his PhD in American History from the University of Oregon in 2013. This article has been viewed 640,981 times.
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