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Many today are angry at our justice system, and many of them have good cause to be angry!
But, some are too angry! Their anger will hurt you! They are out of control! They teach falsehoods! They’re that angry! That’s how you know them. They are not your friend! Their “legal theories” fail. They are blinded by rage. Believe them at your peril. Angry people can rarely be trusted, and that is never more true than when they try to get you to join them in their angry legal theories that run contrary to the rules that control our courts. #1 For example, a nice fellow called me the other day and ended up screaming at me because I refused to go along with his idea that our birth certificates are some kind of “contract”. In the first place, the most fundamental truth about contracts is that no “contract” can bind a party who doesn’t understand the agreement. Even if we were able to understand the alleged binding nature of our birth certificate at the moment of our birth, we didn’t sign the thing! Some doctor did, probably. We cannot be bound by a contract we don’t understand, and certainly not one we didn’t enter into. Yet, this nice man screamed at me for refusing to help him storm the hated walls of justice for him and take up his cause to fight the dragons! #2 Another strange legal myth that’s come around in the last few months is that one can “copyright” his or her own name and thereby prevent the courts from using their name on any court papers. Duh! Anger does twist the mind in strange ways! But, to think one can prevent others from using his or her name by “copyrighting” the name is utter nonsense. I want you to win. You cannot win relying on nonsense! #3 A few are absolutely convinced that our courts are “sitting in admiralty” and therefore cannot rule in common law or statute. But, the fact is that pretty much any court can rule in admiralty cases, if the issue before them is one that involves navigation or the rights of seagoing workers or dockside stevedores. Contract disputes, negligence cases, foreclosure, and other matters are absolutely notadmiralty cases, and the courts that hear such cases are not “sitting in admiralty” … no matter whether there’s a yellow fringe on the flag in the corner or not. #4 More than a few seem to have made a “religion” out of believing such things. Many claim to be “patriots”, yet do all they can to evade the Rule of Law and refuse to do much of anything toward learning the principles of due process so many gave their lives to protect in past and present wars! This group of people get together to talk about how horrible things are but spend very little effort learning how to make things better by learning the rules! I know people are hurting. I’ve been helping thousands upon thousands of good people get justice in the courts since 1997 when I first put Jurisdictionary on the internet. It wasn’t much back then, but I’ve been doing all I can to make it better each year and will do the best I can to continue in the months and years to come. But! If you choose to believe the lies, God help you! Lies are what we’re fighting to overcome. Overcoming lies is what the rules are all about! Please don’t get me wrong. I want to help those who are angry, as well as those who are being destroyed by crooked bankers, corrupt judges, lying lawyers, and the hosts of darkness that never seem to give up in their quest to destroy all that’s good and wholesome in this world we live in. But! YOU … that’s right … YOU cannot afford to believe the lies if you want to get justice in our courts! Your birth certificate is not a contract. You are who you are, no matter whether your name is spelled in ALL CAPITAL LETTERS or all small letters or written out in script with a ball-point pen! And, as far as our courts go, nobody (and I do mean nobody) knows better than I do about the corruption of some judges or the stealth and trickery that lawyers use to twist the truth to their own advantage. But, being angry won’t help. The only thing that will help is learning how to use the rules that control the courts, rules that stop corruption, rules that require judges to grant justice, rules that were paid for by far too much innocent blood already. Please join Jurisdictionary in our effort to uplift the hopes and determination of the American People and even people in other nations around the world where justice is for sale to the highest bidder and good, honest people are sacrificed on the altar of money! Someone once said, “The truth will set you free!” If YOU believe that … if you really believe it … then you will join the work of Jurisdictionary to reach people who are being destroyed all too often simply because they are believing the legal mythology so rampant on the internet, in our daily emails, and even in weekend seminars a few amateurs here and there are putting on for those foolish enough to pay. There’s never been but one way to win any contest! Either you cheat … or you use the rules to your own advantage. Cheaters don’t win all that often. Food for thought? – – – – – – – – Winning is EASY once you know the rules and how to use them effectively! Help Your Friends! Don’t let anyone intimidate you into thinking lawsuits are too complicated for mere mortals to grasp or deceive you into thinking all lawyers are smarter than the rest of the human race … ’cause it ain’t so! Anyone can learn the rules required to win! Anyone! You simply need to start with a clear view of the field of play, the object of the game, and the rules that control all the players … including judges and lawyers! It IS simple … as many thousands have learned! In the 13 years since I launched Jurisdictionary I’ve found the most debilitating factor that infects good people with hopelessness is the fear that comes from lack of knowing how the game of litigation is played to win! Not knowing creates fear. Knowledge displaces fear with the confidence! Take any apparently complicated thing apart to examine its component parts and you quickly see how they all fit together. When you first begin, it seems impossible. But! If someone shows you how each separate part works with each of the other parts, even the most complicated things are suddenly easy-to-understand. The mystery my profession has woven disappears! Every one of you has great legal power! Sadly, many good people never discover the power that is theirs … so people who know how to use the rules of court and the law of the case take advantage of them! Jurisdictionary wants to turn the tables on crooked lawyers and biased judges and protect the “little guys and gals” that are being taken advantage of simply because no one has ever come out with a course like this. No one has ever cared enough to tell you the truth. No one has ever made it this easy-to-understand! It is easy-to-understand how to win in court once you see things the way I teach them! The full details you need to know are in my affordable step-by-step Jurisdictionary course. To learn more, go to: www.Jurisdictionary.com Click this link to watch a FREE VIDEO. ============================
My affordable 24-hour step-by-step lawsuit self-help course includes:
Still Only $249 (plus $7.50 for Priority Mail S&H) Control judges! Save legal fees! Defeat crooked lawyers! Ask anyone who has it: Jurisdictionary Works! Call Toll Free for details: 866-Law-Easy Get your competitive edge before the price increase. Force judges to enforce the rules, instead of allowing the lawyer on the other side twist the law against you! You cannot win if you don’t know how to control the judge and all the lawyers (including your own lawyer, if you can afford to pay one to go to court for you)! You’ve heard the horror stories from others. Don’t let it happen to you! Order my course now, if you don’t already have it. Know the rules and how to force everyone to obey! Know how to draft proper pleadings, how to get your own evidence in the court’s record, how to keep the other side from getting their evidence in, how to move the court to enter orders favorable to your cause, and how to use your Jurisdictionary legal know-how and case-winning strategies to control the judge and win your case! My self-help course is presented in such an easy format people tell us an 8th grader can learn it in just 24 hours! Know what you must know to win! Stop courtroom corruption! I’ll show you how in just 24-hours … step-by-step! Control judges and lawyers – or lose! My “Tips & Tactics” newsletters are only introductions to the complete course you need to win. If you don’t already have my 24-hour step-by-step self-help course, go to my website and order now!
As Woody Guthrie used to sing, “This Land is our Land,” and that includes every courtroom and every courthouse from San Diego to Bangor, Maine. Why let lawyers control our lives with trickery? Why let judges destroy our lives by letting lawyers get away with their trickery? YOU CAN WIN! Forward this article to ALL YOUR FRIENDS! If you aren’t involved in a lawsuit or threatened with one today, learn what my course teaches and help others who will be destroyed by all-too-common courtroom corruption if YOU don’t help them learn what it takes to win! There are more than 150 lawsuits filed every minute in the United States – nearly 100 million each year. Try to imagine how many thousands of good, honest people will be destroyed in the next 7 days just because they have no idea how to protect themselves and have nobody they can trust (or afford) to help them win! Urge everyone to get my affordable 24-hour course! Do it for your nation … and for your children! Dr. Frederick David Graves, JD
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Archive for the ‘advice’ Category
How to Fight Fraud
 Today’s Tips & Tactics will help all of you who are fighting banks, credit card companies, and anyone else who fraudulently claims you owe them money!If you’re an honest person being sued by a dishonest creditor, today’s Tips & Tactics may save you a load of cash … if you do things the way you’ll learn in myofficial affordable 24-hour step-by step Jurisdictionary self-help course! There’s a reason for the phrase, “Put it in writing!” Every jurisdiction we know of adopts a common law principle known as the “Statute of Frauds” so people wishing to sue you for any promise they say you made to them must offer written evidence of that promise …signed by you! No writing, no lawsuit. It could be a mortgage, promissory note, lease, credit card application, or any other promise they say you made. In some states, if the promise was to perform some service that was to be performed in less than one year, or to pay less than $500 for some item like a lawn mower or bicycle, no writing is required … but if the promise was for more than a year or more than a small amount of money, the Statute of Frauds bars the lawsuitif there is no writing signed by you! So, what’s the first thing you do when you’re sued for a promise you did not make?You demand to see the original writing that bears your signature! How do you do that? You use what’s called a Request for Production. The other side has a certain time period within which to comply. If they don’t produce (and many times they’ll put up some bogus objection) you file a Motion to Compel Production and set your motion for hearing. If you do this the way we teach in our 24-hour step-by-step Jurisdictionary self-help course, the judge will ORDER them to produce … and if they fail to obey the order their case will be dismissed! You do not use a subpoena to get documents from the opposing party. You use a Request for Production, and you can use it to get other things as well, if they will likely lead to the discovery of admissible evidence. Help Your Friends! I explain in the Jurisdictionary course how a client came to me after being sued by Sears for a credit card debt. He told me he never had a Sears card, so I served the plaintiff with a Request for Production demanding to see “every document signed by the defendant”. Sears had 30 days to respond. On the 29th day I got a call from Sears’ lawyer saying they couldn’t find any documents signed by my client and asking for an extension of time. I refused. The case was dismissed. Because of the present economic crisis, some judges make an effort to lean favorably toward creditors who come to court without sufficient evidence. If you don’t know what we teach in the Jurisdictionary course, you might find yourself on the short end of a long judgment against you for a debt you truly do not owe. It’s happening far too frequently. Of course the practice of requiring the other side to prove their case (using Requests for Production and your other powerful evidence discovery tools) is a practice you cannot afford to ignore. Proof is what lawsuits are all about. Learn how to prove your position … and how to force the other side to prove theirs! Losers believe in fables and get their legal education at the barbershop or expensive weekend seminars or websites run by people who never practiced law, never went to law school, and don’t know mud from sand about the rules of court or how to use them to prevent fraud. Protect yourself from lawyers and judges! It’s easy, once you understand “due process”. Due process IS your most valuable right. Due process is your most valuable right, because without the ability to win in court, the rest of your “rights” are just political rhetoric, promises with no power. The Constitution of the United States promises you the protection of due process, but it doesn’t tell you what due process is or how to get it! Jurisdictionary was created by a lawyer with more than 23 years of experience winning lawsuits! Winners learn the rules of evidence, the rules of procedure, and how to use the rules to control corrupt judges and overcome crooked lawyers. Learn how to protect yourself! People who have our course tell us an average 8th grader can understand it all in a single weekend. The complete 4-CD course is still only $249. If you have a lawyer, you can save thousands in legal fees just by knowing what the lawyer should be doing to win. If you don’t have a lawyer, you’ll know how to stop the opponent’s crooked tactics and get the judge on your side! The key to winning is knowing how to use the rules!
That’s all there is to it. The rules are actually simpler than the official rules of major league baseball …believe it or not! To learn more, go to: www.Jurisdictionary.com =========================================Our affordable 24-hour step-by-step course includes:
Save legal fees! Control judges! Defeat crooked lawyers! Ask anyone who has our course. “Jurisdictionary Works!” Call Toll Free for details: 866-Law-Easy |
Casey Anthony & Lawyer Know-How
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Circumstantial Evidence Traps
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How to Dodge a Lawsuit !
There are several ways to dodge a lawsuit.
Whether you’re a plaintiff or defendant, you must know what defendants can do to dodge a lawsuit. How to dodge, if you’re a defendant. How to stop the defendant from dodging, if you’re a plaintiff. In this Tips & Tactics, I share a few dodge tricks below. The complete details are yours in my affordable 24-hour step-by-step Jurisdictionary course. People tell us an 8th grader can understand my course in 24 hours. If a defendant is served with a complaint, he may be able to dodge the lawsuit by filing motions to avoid filing an Answer! This tactic is sometimes called the flurry of motions. However! Once a defendant files an Answer, he’s locked in and misses this chance to dodge the lawsuit. Inexperienced lawyers and pro se people (who don’t yet have my Jurisdictionary course) make a common mistake and file an Answer to the plaintiff’s Complaint … instead of using the flurry of motions my course explains:
Each of these motions postpones the necessity of filing an Answer to the plaintiff’s Complaint … and gains you valuable time and evidence-gathering opportunities! In some cases it puts an end to the case. Period! Here are just a few points you absolutely must know. Motion to Dismiss: There are several grounds for filing this motion. Here are a few. The rest are in my course.
The last of these is the most common! If you don’t yet understand causes of action and their elements, you are not yet ready to win in court. The most important piece of knowledge you can learn about lawsuits is that they proceed on one or more causes of action, and each cause of action has certain required elements that must be alleged and ultimately proven. Each is fully explained in my course. Motion to Strike: The following are a few of the many grounds for filing this motion:
The first of these is very powerful and is sometimes called a Motion to Strike Sham Pleading. Know them all, however. Motion for More Definite Statement: This motion should be filed when a Complaint is so poorly-written that a reasonable person would have difficulty understanding what it says, i.e., what the plaintiff is complaining about. The court cannot require you to file an Answer if the Complaint is so poorly-written that no reasonable person could discern what the plaintiff is saying. For example, I’ve filed this motion when sentences in the Complaint had no verb! If you are sued, do NOT file an Answer until you use all these motions that apply to the circumstances! Failure to use the Flurry of Motions weakens your case and, of course, misses a valuable opportunity to dodge the case altogether. Of course you cannot learn all you need to know about the Flurry of Motions or the other case-winning tactics my affordable Jurisdictionary course explains step-by-step in just 24-hours, but this week’s Tips & Tactics gives you an idea what you’ll be missing if you don’t order now. Whether plaintiff or defendant, you cannot hope to win if you don’t know what my course teaches. These tips should convince you to order my complete course … whether you’re a plaintiff or defendant. My affordable Jurisdictionary course explains how to use the Flurry of Motions as a defendant to dodge the plaintiff’s attack and how to defend against the motions if you’re the plaintiff. If you don’t know what opportunities you have in court, you don’t have much of a chance of winning! Even if you fail at dodging the case altogether, there are many positive advantages to making the attempt. By following the Jurisdictionary method explained clearly in my affordable 24-hour step-by-step course, you force the other side to show his hand while running a good chance of dodging the case altogether! Let me urge you to order my course today (if you don’t already have it) so you won’t make the common mistake of assuming you already know everything you need to win! Never file an answer if you don’t have to! Remember: Winners are people who know how the game is played to win — and that includes knowing how to use and respond to the Flurry of Motions — whether you’re a plaintiff or defendant. My affordable 24-hour step-by-step lawsuit self-help course includes:
Still Only $249 (plus $7.50 for Priority Mail S&H) Control judges! Save legal fees! Defeat crooked lawyers! Ask anyone who has it: Jurisdictionary Works! Call Toll Free for details: 866-Law-Easy Get your competitive edge before the price increase. Force judges to enforce the rules, instead of allowing the lawyer on the other side twist the law against you! You cannot win if you don’t know how to control the judge and all the lawyers (including your own lawyer, if you can afford to pay one to go to court for you)! You’ve heard the horror stories from others. Don’t let it happen to you! Order my course now, if you don’t already have it. Know the rules and how to force everyone to obey! Know how to draft proper pleadings, how to get your own evidence in the court’s record, how to keep the other side from getting their evidence in, how to move the court to enter orders favorable to your cause, and how to use your Jurisdictionary legal know-how and case-winning strategies to control the judge and win your case! My self-help course is presented in such an easy format people tell us an 8th grader can learn it in just 24 hours! Know what you must know to win! Stop courtroom corruption! I’ll show you how in just 24-hours … step-by-step! Control judges and lawyers – or lose! My “Tips & Tactics” newsletters are only introductions to the complete course you need to win. If you don’t already have my 24-hour step-by-step self-help course, go to my website and order now!
As Woody Guthrie used to sing, “This Land is our Land,” and that includes every courtroom and every courthouse from San Diego to Bangor, Maine. Why let lawyers control our lives with trickery? Why let judges destroy our lives by letting lawyers get away with their trickery? YOU CAN WIN! Forward this newsletter to ALL YOUR FRIENDS! If you aren’t involved in a lawsuit or threatened with one today, learn what my course teaches and help others who will be destroyed by all-too-common courtroom corruption if YOU don’t help them learn what it takes to win! There are more than 150 lawsuits filed every minute in the United States – nearly 100 million each year. Try to imagine how many thousands of good, honest people will be destroyed in the next 7 days just because they have no idea how to protect themselves and have nobody they can trust (or afford) to help them win! Urge everyone to get my affordable 24-hour course! Do it for your nation … and for your children! Dr. Frederick David Graves, JD
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Lawsuit Anatomy
| Start to learn lawsuit anatomy by spelling: CAT.
Here are the 3 basic steps of every lawsuit.
Start here, and you’ll soon be operating like a pro in court, controlling judges and defeating crooked lawyers. Of course, there’s much more to winning, but it’s all easy if you start with basic anatomy: CAT. C = Complaint … Where every case begins. Plaintiff complains by filing a Complaint. He alleges (1) what duty the defendant breached, (2) how the defendant breached the duty, and (3) how the plaintiff suffered damages (or is threatened with damages) as a direct result. A = Answer … Where defendant responds to plaintiff’s Complaint by filing an Answer and Affirmative Defenses. In his Answer he admits or denies (or claims he lacks enough knowledge to admit or deny) each separate allegation of the plaintiff’s Complaint. In his Affirmative Defenses he alleges facts that (if he can prove them) will relieve him of his obligation to plaintiff. T = Trial … Where the judge (or jury) decides the final verdict by examining admissible evidence, using plain old common sense to decide which facts presented are true, weighing each side’s evidence to see which side has the greater weight of evidence, and then applying the law to determine who wins. Plaintiffs file Complaints. Defendants file Answers. Judges and juries examine the facts and law at trial to decide who wins. During the process Motions and Discovery Tools are used by both sides to convince the court who should win. This is where the fight is – not at trial. Every winnable case can be won before trial, if you use my case-winning tactics. It’s all explained in my affordable Jurisdictionary course. You can learn it all step-by-step in just 24-hours. For example, there are 3 Motions the defendant can use to avoid filing an answer:
After plaintiff files his Complaint, defendant may file any one or all of these motions so he need not answer. If the “flurry of motions” fails, defendant must file an Answer to the complaint – at which time he must also file Affirmative Cefenses, possibly adding counter-claims, cross-claims, or third-party complaints. (All explained in my course.) At any time after the Complaint is filed, either side may use these 5 discovery tools to get facts that may lead to admissible evidence:
Knowing how to use discovery tools (and how to force your opponent to respond truthfully) is essential if you want to win! (All explained in my affordable course.) Lawyers typically play every dirty trick in the book to keep you from getting the evidence you need into the court’s record, so you mustknow how to fight back! That’s the Anatomy of Every Lawsuit! Yes! It really is this simple! If you want to make it complicated and muddy the pond with all kinds of nutty arguments, you can do so and lose. If you want to win, get my affordable Jurisdictionary step-by-step 24-hour course now and master the case-winning strategies and tactics I used for 25 years as a case-winning lawyer in state and federal courts. Every lawsuit has this same fundamental anatomy. The same motions. The same discovery tools. Do you need to win your lawsuit? If you have your own lawyer, know what your lawyer should be doing to earn his fee and win your case. If you don’t have a lawyer, know what you must do to make the judge do his job and prevent the other side from cheating. It’s just that simple. My affordable Jurisdictionary 24-hour step-by-step lawsuit course will show you how to write powerful pleadings, how to draft and argue motions, how to object in court, how to get admissible evidence into the record, how to prevent the other side from getting lies into the record, how to do legal research, how to compose your legal arguments, and much, much more. You’ll learn how to avoid filing an answer by moving the court to dismiss or strike the complaint or require a confusing or poorly-worded complaint to be re-written. You’ll learn how to use effective discovery tools to force the other side to produce facts that may lead to admissible evidence. You’ll discover how to move the court and demand that the judge enforce your legal rights. In short, you’ll learn how to save money, maximize your winning power, and resolve conflicts peacefully and profitably … according to the rules! ________________________________________ Once you master the simple concepts I teach, you’ll be more powerful than most lawyers I met in 25 years as a licensed lawyer in state and federal courts as a licensed bar attorney! Of course you cannot learn all you need to know about what it takes to win by waiting for my Tips & Tactics each week. You need to learn the case-winning tactics in my affordable Jurisdictionary course that will show you what it takes to win, step-by-step in just 24-hours. Whether plaintiff or defendant, you cannot hope to win if you don’t know what my course teaches. These tips should convince you to order my complete course … whether you’re a plaintiff or defendant. If you don’t know what opportunities you have in court, you don’t have much of a chance of winning! Let me urge you to order my course today (if you don’t already have it) so you won’t make the common mistake of assuming you already know everything you need to win! Remember: Winners are people who know how the game is played to win — whether plaintiff or defendant. – – – – – – – The essential tools and elements are explained in the video you can watch right now by clicking the judge. Click the Judge to learn more. You won’t believe me, but most lawyers (and nearly all law school professors) don’t have a clue what it takes to win. Many law schools don’t teach “causes of action” or the elements necessary to prevail. It’s true! Many law schools don’t teach how to use your five (5) discovery tools or why you must be courageous and fight the judge and demand your right to get evidence in the record using your discovery tools. Many lawyers are afraid to upset judges, so they let things slide. They don’t object. They don’t “instruct” the judge on the law. They just lay back, take their hourly fee, and let their clients lose … and those who pay lawyers yet don’t know what Jurisdictionary teaches about winning are led to the slaughter by their own lawyer. Sad, but true! I know what it takes to win. I did this 25 years! My Jurisdictionary will show you how in just 24-hours, step-by-step! The Jurisdictionary Method wins lawsuits! Watch my video and see for yourself how easy it is to use knowledge, stealth, and wisdom to win in court! See what’s important, what’s not, and how to focus all your energy where it belongs: getting court orders! If you gain from watching my video, please forward this newsletter to ALL YOUR FRIENDS by hitting “Forward” on your email program now. Or use this link to send an email to all your friends. You probably know people who need to knock down judges and overcome crooked lawyers and their dishonest tricks. They will thank you for turning them on to this! Or, do both! Forward this newsletter AND send emails to friendsfighting in court who desperately need to know how to win! Most lawyers never learn what Jurisdictionary makes so easy-to-learn. People have been telling me since I started Jurisdictionary in 1997 that, “Your course should be required in first year law school.” But, of course, that’s not likely to happen, because whatJurisdictionary shows you isn’t politically correct! I teach you how to control judges, instead of bowing to them, I I teach you how to overcome crooked lawyers and their all-too-common sneaky tricks! Political correctness prevents justice too often! Winning lawsuits is a brutal axe fight!
Thousands of people just like you are winning with my easy-to-learn 24-hour step-by-step course. Ask anyone who has my course.Everyone loves it! If you don’t know what my course teaches, you lose! End of story! Winners do what Jurisdictionary makes easy-to-learn and don’t wait until trial to get justice! Those who learn my affordable 24-hour step-by-step Jurisdictionary self-help course win … no matter how high the odds are stacked against them! Yes! Read the testimonials in the right column ⇒ Winners know how to fight to win! Losers believe internet fables. Losers get their legal education at the barbershop or on websites or expensive weekend seminars run by people who never practiced law, never went to law school, and don’t know mud from sand about rules or how to use them to control judges. Too many good folks believe mythological silver-bullet easy solutions to their legal problems and, as a result, are losing when they would be winning if they knew what I make so easy-to-learn in my Jurisdictionary course! The internet is infested with hare-brained schemes that sound too good to be true … and, like the old adage says, “If it sounds to good to be true, it probably isn’t.” Remember: The most dangerous falsehoods are ones we most want to believe! Why not learn from a real lawyer with nearly 25 years of case-winning experience? My course is not expensive! People who finish my course say an average 8th grader can learn it all in a single weekend. Please read the testimonials in the right column ⇒ If you have a lawyer, you will save thousands in legal fees by knowing what your lawyer should be doing, and at the same time you will maximize your chances for success by making certain your lawyer does what should be done, instead of taking you for a ride to the poorhouse – as happens to too many good people these days. If you don’t have a lawyer, you’ll know how to stop the opponent’s crooked tricks and control the judge! To learn more, go to: www.Jurisdictionary.com |
60% of UK Survey Respondents Said They Would Buy Legal Advice From National Brands
YouGov, a research firm based in Great Britain, in a survey of consumer preferences for legal services recently reported that 60% of respondents said they would buy legal advice from brands like Barclays, AA, Co-op and Virgin. The report states that “Law firms build their business on their reputation not on their brands and, in a highly fragmented market, recognisable legal brands are few and far between. The large non-legal brands could follow the Co-op’s example and build a strong presence relatively quickly in a market where no strong brands currently exist." In the US there are no national legal brands that serve consumers directly, except for LegalZoom, which isn’t even a law firm. It would be interesting to see what would happen if nationally branded networks of law firms emerged to service consumers with a better value proposition than the typical local solo or small law firm practitioner.
The study also asked about online legal services: 34% of respondents said they would be more likely to choose a law firm that offered the convenience of online access to legal documents over one that had no online capability; 22% disagreed and 37% neither agreed nor disagreed.
Younger males were the most likely to choose a law firm with online services and access: 44% of 25-to-39 year-old males (and 40% of such women), along with 40% of 16-to-24 year-old males, would choose a law firm offering online access to documents over another law firm.
There is obviously a generational shift happening. As a younger generation matures to the age where they have legal problems, their desire to deal with counsel online becomes a preference.
LawPivot: Another Legal Advice Web Site
Another interesting start-up has emerged out of Silicon Valley to provide crowdsourced legal advice to other start-ups for free.
Vertical Q&A web sites seems to be the next new thing among venture capital investors. Even Facebook rolled out this year a crowd-sourced Q&A service.
LawPivot, a legal Q&A web site founded in 2009, hopes to fill a niche by providing legal advice to the founders of start-up and early stage high-tech companies based in California at a legal fee they can afford — FREE. Legal advice is provided by an experienced network of high-priced business law attorneys, recruited from the top 200 hundred or so law firms, who hope to pick up new clients by entering into discussions by providing free legal advice services to start-up companies.
Free legal advice or the “free consult” has been employed by lawyers for years, pre-Internet, as a tried and true marketing strategy for acquiring new clients. Now many lawyers are beginning to offer free legal advice online from their web sites directly. See for example, VirtualEsq.Com . By next year there will be hundreds of these free legal advice services offered directly by lawyers from their web sites as the virtual law firm movement begins to scale.
However, free legal advice from an individual law firm’s web site, is not the same thing as a vertical web site that aggregates answers from many lawyers, giving consumers a wider variety of responses to their particular situation.
Free legal advice online is not a completely new idea. FreeAdvice has been doing it for years, and consumers can get answers to their basic legal questions from sites such as AVVO, RocketLawyer, and JustAnswer. What is new, is that LawPivot provides through its network of lawyers “real” legal advice that applies to the client’s particular situation, as distinguished from merely legal information. And this advice is reputedly to be "high quality" given the stature of the lawyers recruited to the LawPivot network.
However, genuine legal advice, [as distinguished from “legal advice” that is characterized as “legal information” ], like any legal service, has to be delivered in an ethically compliant way requiring that the client’s information be kept confidential, that an attorney/client relationship be established, and that the attorney providing the legal advice be a member of the bar within the jurisdiction where the client is located. Presumably LawPivot is addressing these issues. The LawPivot service is presently limited to California, but the company, according to its representations, plans to expand nationwide.
Although the company recently raised $600,000 from Google Ventures, the venture capital arm of Google, after a $400,0000 round from from a group of angel investors, it will be interesting to see how or whether it survives. At this point, neither the clients are charged for legal advice, nor are the participating attorneys charged an advertising fee. So there is no revenue, and apparently no business model. However, I doubt that the investors thought they were making charitable contributions, so there must be a business model lurking in the background somewhere?
Unfortunately, the only business model that is ethically compliant in the US, is one where the participating lawyers pay an advertising fee to play (get listed) and get exposure. Splitting legal advice fees between a law firm and a non-law firm , is a big “No, No” and an ethical prohibition that exposes the participating attorneys to bar sanctions which could lead to disbarment. Perhaps because Google is now involved as a major backer of LawPivot , and the company is planning to move to the GooglePlex campus start-up incubator, "they can do no wrong.!"
Many other Western common law jurisdictions, like the United Kingdom, have abolished the division of fees, but the rules against splitting fees with non-lawyers remains sacrosanct in the US, on the theory that splitting fees would compromise the independent judgment of the attorney. However, in the UK, lawyers are permitted to work for a profit-making company and provide legal advice directly to consumers, and no one seems to be complaining about compromised judgment. [ See: FirstAssist in the UK for an example ].
Charging clients an administrative fee to “use” the web site, as an alternative revenue source, has been tried before in an earlier Internet era, and it failed then. [ e.g. AmeriCounsel ]. I doubt that this model will work today when consumers are expecting everything on the web to be for free.
I think it is a good sign that innovation is happening in the legal industry, and that private capital is finally looking for a way to get a return by investing in the delivery of legal services. [See: Total Attorneys Receives Multi-Million Dollar Investment ].
I would like to see companies like LawPivot thrive, but at this point I don’t see the juice. Are advertising revenues sufficient to make this venture sustainable, or has LawPivot figured out another legitimate source of revenue that doesn’t violate US ethical prohibitions? Only time will tell.
