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Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court I'm not a lawyer, but my dad is a physician and is sometimes called as a professional witness in cases of malpractice. In one memorable case, a family was suing a doctor for something fairly frivolous, and my dad was a witness for the defense.

The lawyer representing the family was cross-examining my dad and brought up a chapter in a medical textbook and asked my dad to read a highlighted paragraph. He did, and the lawyer said something to the effect of, 'So, what you just read means...' My dad confidently replied, 'No, it does not mean that.'

Lawyer: No, but if you read xyz, the author clearly states...

Dad: No, really, that's not what the author means.

Lawyer: How do you know that's not what the author meant?

Dad: Well, because I wrote it.

Judge basically facepalmed while the lawyer mimicked a goldfish and stared at the author name on the chapter. Basically the best moment of my dad's professional life. (Yes, ruling was in the defendant's favor.)

linkcecum Report

Final score:

298points

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IeabellAlakar@aqueenofaplanet 2 years ago

"Lawyer mimicked a goldfish" Made my day

95points

We reached out to one of the Redditors who shared their story in this thread. They preferred to stay anonymous but were kind enough to share their thoughts. According to the user, there's quite a number of cases where people try to screw someone over in court only to see it backfire in the best possible way.

"I think it happens a decent amount, if not always so spectacularly as listed out in that thread," they told Bored Panda. We were interested to hear the user's take on why some people decide to act this way. "In my experience, people try to pull shenanigans because they think they’re the smartest person in the room and that everyone will just accept what they say at face value."

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Well, not my story, but a prior boss's story:

They had a drunk-driver-kills-a-car-worth-of-people case at the time when they were a general practitioner. My boss was representing the family that got hit (one where the two kids and the wife had died, but the father had not) and wanted the college guy's drunk-driving skin to be mounted on a wall.

This was back before Facebook was commonly used in Court proceedings and before tons of people realized that s**t is too great for any attorney worth their weight in salt to pass up.

So, the kid (drunk driving college kid) had managed to get the judge's sympathy during the first part of the hearing by saying he was sorry, haunted, never going to drink again, this was going to ruin his life, etc. The judge seemed to really be eating it up.

Then comes my boss and immediately burns this kid's remorse to the ground by showing numerous Facebook statuses and photos of them binge drinking, partying, and even joking about driving drunk from the date of the accident up until a night ago. The kid looked like he was being forced to swallow hot coals and the judge was absolutely livid.

Needless to say, the kid had to do way more than just apologize and be remorseful after that.

rivlet Report

Final score:

210points

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Kat O. 2 years ago

Absolutely disgusting that some of these rich little snot nosed pr!cks actually do get away with this.

143points

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court I represented a guy who stole three trucks from his work. Only two were recovered before trial. He showed up to a motion hearing in the third one.

Wacocaine Report

Final score:

198points

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Francisco Manuel Teruel Gutiérrez 2 years ago

I just can feel simpathy for that fool.

4points

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Not a lawyer but this story always gets me. My biological grandmother died 20 years ago of ovarian cancer, she left all her money, trusts, bonds to my grandfather to use (while alive) and disperse (after death). My grandfather remarried something like 15 years ago to my step-grandma. My grandfather ended up dying first a few years back.

My step aunt is a greedy b***h who lives on the opposite side of the country, she's lived off of her mother and my grandfather for all of her life. She'd come over and take them on "vacation" where she'd use their money to buy herself things and get a free skiing trip about 8x a year.

After my grandfather passed, my step-grandma had to move where her children live to get care for dementia. My step-aunt has access to not only her own mother's estate but my grandfather's as well to take care of her needs.

That wasn't enough.

She decided to try and sue my dad and uncle for their dead biological mother's estate.

My dad is bilaterally paralyzed and in a wheelchair.

My uncle is a triple bypass survivor with a pacemaker and multiple stints. Both are on fixed disability income.

The court date came and I literally wheeled my dad in while my uncle walked with a cane.

My step-aunt is entirely able bodied and rolling in the millions my step grandma and grandfather worked their whole lives to earn.

The judge took one look at the whole picture and she was absolutely denied access to my biological grandmothers estate. We were there for less than an hour.

soselections Report

Final score:

185points

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Hugh Cookson 2 years ago

Good - common sense prevails.

88points

5468726f77_61776179 Report

The user added that there’s also an aspect of control involved in such behavior "as a lot of people think they can manipulate the proceedings or the judge to steer it in some absurd direction. It’s a weird, misguided hyper-self-confidence."

However, they explained that such efforts usually don’t work. "The judge and the attorneys in the room have heard it all before, and can generally see right through it. People forget that what is a huge deal for them as a litigant is often just business as usual for the judges and attorneys, even if it is very important business," the Redditor explained.

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court IANAL but this case got pretty big when I was serving in the US Navy. Largely because it involved a sailor.

So, this Submariner gets divorced from his Wife. Ex-wife originally gets custody of their son, due to the nature of the Submariner's operation schedule. Ex-wife later looses custody due to being convicted of Child Abuse/Neglect. The ex-wife wasn't having this, because now there was no more free money for her.

The Submariner gets a GF, and gives her guardian rights over his son while on deployment. They live in California due to orders, and the ex-wife lives in Michigan (if I recall). The ex-wife waits until Submariner goes on deployment and "serves" him papers for a custody battle, again on the grounds of his schedule. The trial is set for the next month in Michigan.

The problem with being stationed onboard a sub, you only surface every couple months and almost never have comms off-ship. Sub guys give family or SO's Power of Attorney all the time because of this. The court papers were sent and the trial occured when he had no communication. The female judge who presided over the case sympathized with the ex-wife, decided that children belonged with their mother and not in the care of random women, and that the Abuse conviction was likely false. Ex-wife was granted custody by default, and the judge tried to get the Submariner on Contemt of Court for not showing up. Until his Chain of Command heard about it.

See, it's illegal in the US to punish a service member for missing a court date due to military operations or deployments.

The Submariner's Chain of Command called a JAG, who assigned the Submariner a lawyer. His lawyer took the appeal to the Michigan State Supreme Court. The original judge isn't a judge anymore, and the ex-wife is now permanently labeled unfit to care for children.

Final score:

165points

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Hugh Cookson 2 years ago

Good

75points

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Nasty custody fight

The ex-wife was a lawyer and represented herself. The ex-husband had a pretty s**ty lawyer. She kept hauling things back to court trying to get more benefits from him and his lawyer just let it keep happening and it was destroying his life - allegations of child abuse, was taking so much money that he could barely afford a s**t apartment and couldn't afford a car which both figured in later for custody.

Finally the ex-wife's father (also a lawyer) asked to meet with the judge and mentioned a few things that he knew were going on...

One of the children was manic-depressive and the ex-wife would take him off his meds before it was the ex-husband's turn for custody. The child abuse allegations were from the ex-husband trying to restrain the child during a manic episode because he wasn't medicated.

The ex-wife had intentionally timed the child abuse allegation to fall just before the holidays so the ex-husband couldn't see the kids for Halloween - Thanksgiving - Christmas. She bragged to family that it would do the maximum emotional damage possible doing it then.

The ex-wife had forged documents to overstate the ex-husband's income when alimony was being determined

Oh... and the ex-wife was sleeping with the ex-husband's lawyer.

The ex-husband's lawyer was reported to the bar (not sure what happened there). The Judge order a review of everything and arranged for a new lawyer for the ex-husband. It was looking like the alimoney would be vastly reduced and the ex-husband was going to get custody. But then the ex-husband died (blood clot) two months later. Years of being screwed over, finally saw a light at the end of the tunnel, but ended up being the wrong light at the end of the wrong tunnel.

varthalon Report

Final score:

157points

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Stina Lamar 2 years ago

This is horrible and so sad.

140points

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court My wife is the lawyer.

Info: When children reach the age of majority if they do not continue studying and start working, it is not necessary to pay alimony.

Info: My wife's client found a new lover, which unleashed the wrath of the ex-wife, who started asking for more alimony for her children.

Well to win the case, it was necessary to prove that the children were working, but they could not get any proof of it.

There was not much chance of winning, but they still went to court hoping that with the interrogations they could find information that would put them in evidence.

On the day of the trial the children did not go, only the mother and her lawyer were present.

Judge: Madam, tell me why your children could not come.

Mom: they could not get permission at work.

Judge:...

Lawyer:...

Mom: ...

Another few seconds of silence.

Judge: well, that was fast.

CiusWarren Report

Final score:

152points

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WilvanderHeijden 2 years ago

There should be financial and criminal consequences for people who abuse the legal system with fraudulent or absurde claims.

106points

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court I work in criminal law, and once saw a defendant who was charged with simple theft of mail matter. He was a porch pirate and had stolen a package that was worth less than $100. When he was initially arraigned he was offered a 30 day jail sentence to plead guilty. He refused and insisted upon going to trial.

When his case reached my office, he was again given a reasonable offer of 2 years. Because he had a lengthy criminal history he was considered a persistent offender, so the offer was more than what a package thief would typically get, but reasonable nonetheless.

It’s important to note that he was caught on security camera actually stealing the package, and getting into a car that was registered to him. Basically we had him dead to rights. But, he still insisted on trial. So we tried the case. The jury found him guilty and imposed the statutory maximum sentence given his criminal record—20 years.

That’s the story of the man who turned a 30 day sentence into 20 years.

virgil_caine31 Report

Final score:

151points

POST

Huddo's sister 2 years ago

He believed he was a really good con man so would fool jury, when he was just a really bad theif.

53points

Needless to say, most people find going to court a stressful situation. For many of us, it is often an unfamiliar and even scary ground, but that does not mean we should let our emotions get out of control. Misleading your attorney, providing false information, or thinking you can trick and outsmart everyone else in court can come back to bite you. After all, the truth almost always finds its way out.

"Once the court sees that you are trying to do something shady or act in bad faith, they are much less likely to do you any favors or give you the benefit of the doubt moving forward," the user added.

#10

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Not the worst, but one sticks out that they did to themselves. Woman shows up to court in a 'It's party time, b***hes! Drink up!' T-shirt. She was there for her first appearance on a third DUI charge. Judge was not in a humorous mood that day.

Lionel_Hutz_Law Report

Final score:

142points

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Paul C. 2 years ago

Easier if she just wore a T-shirt with, lock me up, I'm stupid.

76points

#11

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Kind of a self-screw, but the MPA (Motion Picture Association), as part of their lawsuit, entered [hacker] DVD Jon's code for breaking DVD copy protection into their evidence, which then became public record. The code that breaks DVD copy protection was now available to the entire world, defeating the entire purpose of their lawsuit.

tensigh Report

Final score:

137points

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WilvanderHeijden 2 years ago

DVD copy protection never worked and pirates wouldn't want exact copies anyway because people bought the illegal copies to avoid having to see the unskippable anti-piracy messages.

35points

#12

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Am lawyer, saw someone screw himself.

I work as a public servant in a criminal law judge's office, and since I have a law degree I don't normally do administrative work, though I get to be with the judge in some of the hearings.

Last month we had a huge drug trafficking case (I'm talking about 20 or more people involved, months of investigation, undercover agents, videos, audio, the whole ordeal). Hearing lasted three days.

Anyway when it was time for one of the defendants to be on the stand so the prosecutor could read the charges he was accusing him of (He was pleading not guilty, as he very loudly stated from the majority of the hearing, up until my boss -the judge- told him to shut up or he would be admonished, to which he replied "what are you gonna do, arrest me?" which, to be honest, was actually a bit funny), the prosecutor, as part of the facts of his case, told him that "he was being accussed of selling, traficking and carrying x amount of x drugs, with the base of his operation being his house, where he lived with his partner" (Mind you, said partner wasn't even in the hearing, she wasn't arrested or anything as there was nothing tying her to the case) he said "wait up, I was the one selling the drugs, she didn't do anything".

His lawyer (a state assigned public lawyer) facepalmed so hard it's actually recorded in the audio of the hearing.

He still pleaded not guilty.

mildepan Report

Final score:

127points

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CLG 2 years ago

That 4th paragraph is one unbelievably long single sentence.

64points

#13

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court I'm not a lawyer, but a friend kept meticulous records of how much time his estranged wife spent with their daughter. He used pink highlighter for the mom and blue highlighter for himself. Mom sailed into arbitration demanding full custody and handsome child support and the house. Dad pulled out three years' worth of yearlong calendars. Mom had spent less than a full month with the child in three years. Mom was not happy with the outcome.

Omars_daughter Report

Final score:

123points

POST

Joanne Lawrence 2 years ago

The people who want full - or even, in some cases, equal - custody without apparently ever thinking about the time commitment required blows my mind. I do 100% believe that a child has the right to have equal time with both parents(the law where I live is it's the child's rights to have a relationship with their parents - the parents don't actually have a reciprocal right). But like, I've seen cases where the dad is making bank in the oilfield working like 3 weeks on, one week off, flying in and out and adamant that he can somehow share physical custody with that kind of schedule, or he swears he'll find a new job. I do absolutely sympathize with these fathers to some extent because they work hard to support their lifestyle and that of their children, but on the other hand, actions speak louder than words, and the time to make changes and prove that you can handle shared access is long before it gets in front of a judge.

34points

But when it comes to hearing or reading about such situations online, our fascination with the law seems to be stronger than ever. These elements of surprise glue our eyes to the screens, grab our attention and don’t let go. "I think people like those stories because we don’t all have to be in court that often so it’s something new. Plus there’s something satisfying in reading about someone else doing something bad only to have it backfire," they concluded.

#14

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court I’m currently representing a sweet old lady on a case. I’ll be sparse in the details in case anyone figures out who I am.

Long story short, this lady’s neighbour convinces her that her house is basically unsellable, that her house requires all sorts of repairs, the repairs to the house would bankrupt her, and that she should just sell the house. To him.

He shows up at her house the next day with documents to sign. She has no idea what’s going on. Doesn’t read anything (actually has an eye condition) and signs everything.

When she finally sees a lawyer to close the deal, he says wtf you can’t do this. You see, the price of the transaction was about 36% of what the house is actually worth and there weren’t any repairs that needed to be done that would justify the price. Not kidding, it was stuff like fixing a faucet in the bathroom.

Also she didn’t understand that she would have nowhere to live afterwards. Old lady thought she could just stay in the house until she died.

To make matters worse, she’s living off a modest pension and the other side is suing for the house. They’re essentially trying to get her to cave because her legal fees are getting exorbitant.

I hate people.

bloated-penguins Report

Final score:

123points

POST

Cody 2 years ago

Yeah, that guy needs to be put in jail for elderly abuse or something.

111points

#15

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court A wife filed for a restraining order because she wanted the house during divorce. Husband had a good job, making like $200,000 per year. Employer finds out about the restraining order and the husband is fired. He was a very specialized employee, so the only job he can find close to his house, ex-wife, and daughter pays $50,000. Ultimately, the house gets foreclosed. Child support lowers to less than $500 per month. Wife has to get a job as a waitress. Four cars get repossessed.

Thencewasit Report

Final score:

118points

POST

Moezzzz 2 years ago

Idiot. I hate stories where women try to screw their ex out of everything, just out of spite, esp when kids are involved. My ex and I shared a lawyer and I didn't ask for anything but my car (kids were going to go between the two of us, alternating weekends and years until they were old enough to decide where they wanted to live all the time). I couldn't see forcing my ex to sell the house they grew up in (we were in his hometown and I moved back to my family for a bit), sell the "toys" (boat, jet skis, etc) Bc then I'd be taking it away from my sons. Why don't people take a second to breathe and think about what they're taking from their kids? I'd like to think that Bc there was no animosity or hate between us that they did so well in school (one is in college and the other headed there in the fall).

9points

#16

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court I had a client who was trying to get away from an abusive ex and filed for a restraining order. He shows up to the final hearing and is making a big fuss about a truck that they bought during their marriage. He said it was just his, and she had no rights to it because their marriage was void.

I asked him on cross examination what he meant by that, and he said that he had already been married in another state when he married my client. He said that my client had no idea, but that it means their marriage is invalid and the truck was all his.

Not only is that legally inaccurate, the transcript of the hearing was promptly turned over to the police, who were actively investigating him for bigamy.

Oh, and the judge gave my client the truck along with a two year no-contact order.

www.reddit.com Report

Final score:

115points

Gabija Palšytė

POST

Kat O. 2 years ago

Gotta love it when these idiots get screwed.

47points

#17

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court This person screwed the selves and their company. Used to practice employment law and had a guy who was terminated, in part allegedly due to his race. His former boss was on the stand and was under direct questioning from his attorney. His attorney asked if there was a reason that he singled out our client in his treatment (assumingly to get to the fact that our guy had disciplinary issues and had been been put on a performance improvement plan). Instead he went off and talked about how just have to “ treat those people differently” and “you can’t talk to them the same way you do others.” Our cross examination was very very short. Employee was black and boss was Asian if it matters (people always seem to ask when I tell the story).

Tex236 Report

Final score:

113points

POST

WilvanderHeijden 2 years ago

People do ask because it's common knowledge that only white people can be racist... [Sarcasm: Off]

55points

#18

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Not court but it is legal adjacent.

My dad is an executive safety officer at the company he works at, and one of the company's truck drivers got into an accident. The driver wasn't at fault but it is company policy anytime a driver gets into an accident they drug test them same day, and when the results came back the guy failed the test.

The guy disputed the results so they had him retake it. When he finishes up in the testing facilities bathroom, the sample he gives them isn't warm at all, clearly hadn't just come out of person. And in the bathroom, which they meticulously clean between each test, they find a strip of tape and like a little vile and cap thing that would have went onto a small vile kind of container.

So my dad has to be on a conference call with the driver and his manager and some other relevant parties and the guy maintains is innocence, and they can't like conclusively prove the tape or cap means he cheated the test, so they're kind of at an impasse.

As they're getting off the call my father just kind of takes a shot and asks the driver really nonchalantly and in passing "Say, doesn't taping the vile to your leg hurt? Like how do you get it off?" and the f**king guy replies without missing a beat "Oh no, it was just painters tape, comes off easy didn't hurt at all"

There was like 5 seconds of dead air after that before the guy scrambled and tried to put the tooth paste back in the tube. The company was able to fire him without any trouble.

123hig Report

Final score:

108points

POST

mulk 2 years ago

"tried to put the tooth paste back in the tube": I love this metaphore!

12points

#19

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court This one time, a pro se litigant was suing a wonderful surgeon who had done nothing wrong. One of the attempted arguments was that the surgeon's physician assistant wasn't competent to assist with procedures and follow-ups.
So the guy asks the surgeon if he HONESTLY thinks physician assistants know what they're doing and if the surgeon knows what's reasonable to expect of one. The surgeon, who was patient and humble up until this point, kindly replied that he founded the entire practice of having physician assistants in the US and that he came up with the idea while serving in combat, where he saw how helpful medics were to him while he was operating on an overwhelming number of casualties. And that, yes, he has a very good one at the hospital.

Final score:

107points

POST

Moezzzz 2 years ago

PAs are awesome. Basically a step above a Nurse Practitioner (they're specialized in certain fields, like surgery, Cardiology, Gastroenterology, etc). In fact, my primary care provider is a Nurse Practitioner. I've found that they're more thorough, and listen to me more than my MD does (he's great, he's just always so damn busy). I'm an RN, so I may be biased

29points

#20

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Not my case, but still my favorite story. Dude screwed himself over when he went to jury trial for a burglary charge and wore the same distinct sweatshirt he wore the night he committed the crime. Kind of hard to argue that the guy in the video isn't your client at that point. Needless to say, he was convicted and spent a few years in the Department of Correction.

Seinfeldologist Report

Final score:

104points

POST

Paul C. 2 years ago

Ain't no cure for stupid.

51points

#21

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Not a lawyer, legal assistant. My attorney is pretty old so he needs me to help him find papers in stuff in the courtroom so I go over for all domestic and criminal cases. We had a custody case where the mom was already screwed because she was literally picked up by a bounty hunter while the dad was there getting their daughter for visitation.

Anyway, dad’s new wife gets on stand and testifies that the mom, the defendant, threatened to blow their house up. Mom gets on stands and says, “I didn’t threaten to blow your house up. I threatened to blow you up.”

I remembered another one. Had a criminal client who choked his wife out. Told the investigator, ”I mean I knew what I was doing, I know how to choke someone out without killin’ ’em.”

Never change, Alabama.

Final score:

95points

POST

Thorfin Wolfsbane 2 years ago

"Never Changing" is Alabama's state motto.

51points

#22

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court One time, I saw an indigent defendant who was in custody tell the judge his public defender wasn't working hard enough and he wanted the judge to appoint different counsel. The judge asked him what specifically was the problem and he said "I don't want a female lawyer. I need a man who can take charge and fight for me" or something very similar to that. The judge (also female) said that's not how it works, then he starting yelling and getting into specifics about his public defender, just mainly I don't like her, she won't visit me, etc. The judge is annoyed and looks at him and is like fine, I'll appoint another attorney for you, but because you are not satisfied with your attorney and I need time to appoint you new counsel I am not going to hear any other issues today and will reset your case.

A few days later the judge sends defendant notice of his new appointed attorney, who happens to also be female, and notice of the case reset for six weeks. The case was originally set for a bond hearing and the DA and his PD had agreed to release him on an unsecured bond meaning he would have gotten out that day, if he hadn't thrown his temper tantrum. Instead he waited another six weeks in jail just to have another female attorney represent.

vayaconburgers Report

Final score:

88points

POST

over it already 2 years ago

Serves him right!

58points

#23

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court I was involved in a custody case where a wife cheated on her husband and had a child as a result. She let the husband believe the child was his until the child was about 5 years old and they were divorcing. To stop him from getting custody, she convinced the biological father to try to get custody, thinking that if he won, she would wind up with the child.

It became a huge three-way fight, with multiple sets of grandparents involved, and the attorneys' fees skyrocketed because the case would have been pretty quick otherwise. She couldn’t pay her attorney, tried to get the bio dad to, it got even messier, etc. Basically, there still isn’t an agreement all parties will follow. They are in and out of court every year or so. She screwed herself.

Carcharodons Report

Final score:

83points

POST

Sam 2 years ago

That poor kid

102points

#24

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court I took my Ex to court because she had used my social security number to sign up for cable. I found out about it when she stopped paying for the service. She screwed herself over by just being herself. We show up to court, I turn in the contract from the cable company ,showing my social security number, and her own name signed on the contract. She didn't even try to forge my signiture, she signed her own name in and tried to deny that she had any part of it. The judge tore her apart and it was nice.

Hardly_at_Work Report

Final score:

80points

POST

Seabeast 2 years ago

How do people end up with partners like this?

18points

#25

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court I spent a summer as an intern doing narcotics work. You’d be surprised how much information defendants and their friends/family share over prison telephone calls, even when the line informs you that the line is being monitored and recorded before the call begins."

That said, a defendant maintained he was an innocent Uber driver and was not in the business of selling drugs...meanwhile, he was telling his wife over the phone that they needed to figure out how to move 3 kilos of cocaine so they could afford the lawyer to represent him. Needless to say, he was shocked when the recording was played back in court.

lawtinaaa Report

Final score:

79points

POST

Kira Okah 2 years ago

Probably hoping that it ends up like the guy who had to be exonerated with the help of a tv show - the police had a recording of the actual perp ordering the hit on a kid from a prison phone but left it sitting in the back of the detective's car for two years as 'unimportant'. With the police attitude being like that, it not surprising.

10points

#26

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Not someone else, but my client screwed them-self.

I’m doing landlord tenant stuff and my client was facing eviction over non-payment, but the client was withholding rent payments because of habitability issues in the apartment, no heat, high lead levels, vermin. This is gonna be an easy win for me.

Told my client continually to make sure they don’t spend the money, keep it but don’t spend it. Because if you show the judge you still have the money it looks real good for you in terms of making the judge believe that you’re withholding for good reasons.

We get up in front of the judge, landlord doesn’t have an attorney so I’m dancing inside, there’s no way I can lose.

I make my arguments and the landlord makes his.

Judge asks my client if they still have the money.

Client goes “nah I blew that s**t at the casino last week”

Final score:

79points

POST

Hugh Cookson 2 years ago

Some people deserve to be homeless ....

22points

#27

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Someone I knew had a pro bono case where she had to defend a person who had been charged with a criminal offense (don't know what — confidential and whatnot). Even though the police and DA could pretty much link the crime to her client, there was no evidence to tie him to it; the case was circumstantial at best.

She had instructed him to shut up and let her do the talking during the trial, since she knew from experience that the client sometimes does not know how to answer a question properly. So she pleads and can show that the court has nothing on her client; she feels that for once, a pro bono case is going her way.

After her plea, the judge thanks her for her plea and turns to her client. He asks if the client has something to add to the plea. Client looks at her, then back at the judge; tears well up in his eyes and he blurts out, 'I'm so sorry, I'll never do it again!

She threw her notes and everything else she had in her hands at the client (now convict), apparently. She basically got screwed by her own client, who screwed himself even worse.

ILoveLactateAcid Report

Final score:

75points

POST

John C 2 years ago

How did we end up with a legal system where even when your lawyer knows you're guilty their job is still to get you set free?

29points

mymomdoesmylaundry Report

#28

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Not a lawyer but a friend of mine was going through a divorce and his lawyer kept putting off the trial. He just wanted it over with but the lawyer said trust me this is going to be good. Turns out dudes wife was pregnant with another mans baby. When they went to court she had a big baby bump. The judge asked if all three kids were his and she replied" no just those two". Wish I could have seen the look on her lawyers face.

Final score:

74points

POST

Klorx 2 years ago

I guess it WAS worth it after all.

24points

#29

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court My dad was a judge and had someone on trial for DUI. The guy would not stop running his mouth and was trash-talking everyone in the room. He instructed him to stop. Dude did not stop. Dad placed him in contempt of court for 90 days.
Dude gets out, goes back to trial. First thing, he starts running his mouth again. Boom. Another 90 days in jail for contempt. He does 180 days in jail, when a DUI in our state is only 60 days for his level of DUI.

notjawn Report

Final score:

72points

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Robert Trebor 2 years ago

Half a year of no rent, 3 hots and a cot.

16points

#30

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Not a lawyer but when my FIL and MIL got divorced, she wanted to file jointly for the previous year because they were still married. They would have gotten a decent refund. He insisted on filing separately, despite the fact that he would owe 4k, because he wanted her to also owe the IRS. He did it to "frost her"

69schrutebucks Report

Final score:

64points

POST

Kat O. 2 years ago

Dumba$$.

25points

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#31

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Too many criminal client situations to count of them screwing themselves over. One of the very few family law cases I handled as a young atty sticks out to me though.

Young woman and Young man have Child. Young woman seeks divorce from young man because he enjoys the "thug life", he had recently been arrested and charged for possession w/ int to distribute meth (felony) and in possession of a firearm (unlawful carry). Young man doesn't like her leaving him. He hires a local big name top divorce atty (granted, very rural area). Gets temp divorce order entered saying she can not have overnight guests of the opposite sex (common in rural conservative areas, think it's mostly a thing of the past in more urban places).

Young woman starts seeing someone new. Young man is very upset about this. Has his fancy lawyer ask for a hearing accusing her of violating court order and seeking full custody, on top of atty fees. Young woman, on advice from a mutual friend, hires me for this hearing. I sit down with opposing counsel, and she basically tries to strong arm me w/ her experience and lays out egregious terms...mother must not only give up primary custody, but must have visitation with a supervisor and pay child support and atty fees. She knows I'm a new baby atty in town (fairly certain I had been licensed for less than a year). I balk and she says she'll see us in court.

I go into hearing with a copy of his probation arrangement on his Poss w/ Intent to sell & unlawful carry. He hasn't told his atty about this, and she is unaware. She calls him up establishes how my client had her new bf over on x,y,z nights. Judge is VERY conservative, not pleased.

Then, opposing counsel passes the witness. I ask him if he has a job. No. What do you do for money? Things here and there. Oh? Ms. opposing counsel is awfully expensive...Do you sell meth?","...What?", "Have you ever sold drugs to make ends meet?", "Uhhh no." Introduce a copy of his guilty plea and straight probation sentencing. Judge is now staring daggers at him. I lean over to my client sitting next to me, and whisper, "if you took a drug test today, be honest, would you be completely clean?" "Yes."

I ask the Young man, "When was the last time you did meth", atty objects, but Judge overrules...I know this judge will drug test people on the spot as he is also the misdemeanor drug court judge. "It's been years, I'm clean.", "So, if you were tested, you'd be clean?" "Yes." Opposing counsel asks the same of my client, we agree. Judge has them both tested. He tests positive for meth. My client is clean.

Judge denies his motion, and asks me to send in new temp orders where young man is required to maintain employment and start paying child support and places him on supervised visits.

Icing on the cake, opposing counsel actually calls me and leaves me a voicemail congratulating me on, and I quote, "handing her a** to her for the first time in a long time."

gr33nm4n Report

Final score:

28points

POST

Summer Mason 2 years ago

I had almost the same thing happen. Only my ex had two duis one public intoxication charge and attempted suicide by motor vehicle that cause bodly harm to passenger.

4points

#32

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court This one is timeless, and I bet every criminal lawyer has seen it.
Us: We've gotten you an incredible result; just stand up and apologize and DON'T SAY ANYTHING ELSE.

Client: Okay.

Us: No, seriously, we mean it. DON'T MONOLOGUE, just say you're sorry, and we've convinced the judge to give you a lenient sentence.

Client: Okay.

Judge: Defendant, do you have anything to say?

Client: [Extended monologue about how unfairly he's been treated]

Judge: [HAMMER]

Us: You dumba**

KenPopehat Report

Final score:

26points

POST

WilvanderHeijden 2 years ago

It's still fun to watch the old Judge Judy shows. they are all lessons in stupidity, greed and insane logic. "Yeah, I saw how my kid scratched his new car, but he has a good job and can pay for the repairs himself. He ain't getting no money out of me..."

11points

#33

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court This happened to me, but I was the client that passed.

Child custody hearing. My baby was 6 months old when we spent all of 20 mins in the court room for the judge to hand down standard visitation for temp orders; including 30 days in the summer. (what moron in their right mind sends a nursing baby to 30 days overnight with 1 weekend visitation for the mother is beyond me but I digress.)

Literally the day before 30 days is to go into effect, and my attorneys are throwing a hail Mary. I remember testifying in court. Ex was aggressive. He had never actually put his hands on me but throwing things, punching holes in the walls, throwing furniture. He had a temper, and he got agitated easily, especially when our infant wouldn't calm down effortlessly. Needless to say I was terrified of her spending 30 days there without him having a break. She hadn't even spent the night with him before this point. And the judge orders an immediate drug test for both of us (something neither of us were asking for) and orders that the test include testing for steroids.

Steroids? I don't use steroids? And here's the kicker- never in a million years did I suspect him of using them since they literally cost one of his closest friends their life. And what happens? Boom- he tests positive for steroids.

Reversed everything and he has supervised visitation for 3 hours every other Saturday. Went from expanded standard visitation to 6 hours supervised a month. Idiot.

agirlhasnoname20 Report

Final score:

26points

POST

Joanne Lawrence 2 years ago

Interesting. The judge must have heard the evidence, looked at him, and put 2 and 2 together that roid rage was a possibility.

22points

#34

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Not a lawyer but this happened to my family. My husbands kids asked us to fight for full custody after years of systematic abuse from their mom.

My stepdaughter was sexually assaulted and mom decided to marry a guy who was best friends with the guy who assaulted her. Mom never told us what happened never got her counseling. Never reported it to the police.

In mediation she brought up a conversation I had with her which she denied ever happening until then. She started saying lie after lie and all my husband had to say was “my wife had that conversation with you to explain how uncomfortable my daughter is living with this man because he is connected to her sexual assault “

The mediator was not amused. She said “you have someone living in your house who is connected to your daughters assault. Your relationship with your children is broken”

She spent the rest of the session sobbing and signed away custody because this was just the tip of the iceberg that we had on her and she knew it.

Hearing her sobbing made me so happy after all she put these kids through. I had to walk my step daughter into the police station to report her sexual assault.

I usually don’t want people to suffer but after warning her this guy was coming between her and her kids and then her lying about the context of that conversation ill make an exception. I tried to stop her from the chain of events that lead us to court and she tried to use it against me.

phoenixrising8580 Report

Final score:

24points

POST

KombatBunni 2 years ago

Good for you. Parents who let kids be abused don’t deserve to be parents.

24points

#35

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court I am not a lawyer, but there was a case going on in my town between a father and son that was hilarious. The dad is a big time personal injury attorney around here who started his own firm under his name, George Sink and his son ended up joining the family business. Well they had a falling out so the son goes off to start his own firm.

He has his dad's name.

So the dad is suing the son for using the name he gave him to start his own law firm.

Disglain Report

Final score:

24points

POST

Pezor Zass 2 years ago

Apparently the dad won that case and the son can't advertise his law practice using his name

4points

#36

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Not someone else, but himself.

The guy and his lawyer missed court appearances, sometimes one of them, sometimes both, with little or no warning and with suspect excuses. It started getting ridiculous and we kept pointing out holes in his story, like he said he left for another country without knowing about the appearance, but his lawyer stood in court and said he told him beforehand. Or all of a sudden he was in a former Soviet Bloc country for fertility treatments and it would ruin everything if he came back now. Or when he was visiting dying relatives on another continent. Or he was going to the airport when he had to rush to the hospital and showed us an admitting form in another language that we translated - it showed he was there but also that he was discharged. He also tried firing his attorney and saying he needed more time to brief a new attorney - who at the next appearance would say he hasn't been able to talk to his client so he needs to adjourn. Or that he hasn't been paid and his client is basically an a** and he needs to be relieved.

We kept saying to the judge he was doing it to stall but the judge kept giving him the benefit of the doubt. We even showed him other cases where he skipped appearances and the judges threatened sanctions. Until finally he didn't show up for an appearance where the judge had specifically told him, I don't care if you're meeting with the Pope, I'm ordering you to be here. Boom, his answer was stricken, default judgment in full was granted to our side. Neither he nor his lawyer showed up for the hearing where the judge determined exactly how much of a judgment we should get, and then had the nerve to file a motion that the judgment was unfair because he didn't get a chance to dispute anything.

carriegood Report

Final score:

24points

POST

lara 2 years ago

A good friend of mine who is a writer wrote a book that caused the US government to try and throw him and his wife into jail. The government claimed that my friend "stole" evidence from a crash site, he did not, it was given to him by one of the investigators. The trial was held, the government prosecutors [PLURAL] refused to allow my friend to show that he was an investigative journalist. The trial lasted four weeks. The jury found them "guilty" after twenty minutes of "deliberation." The judge threw out the jury's "decision" saying that there was very, very little to NO evidence against the wife, or the government investigator and absolutely NO evidence against my friend. Now here is why the government will take you to court even over "nothing charges". First it costs YOU a lot of time and money and ruins your reputation even though the government knows you are "innocent." If you turn around and sue they, the government NEVER shows up to defend because Congress will not pay.

8points

#37

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Someone came to a civil hearing for a money damage claim on a rental unit. Claimed first that they could not have punched holes in the wall as those holes were left handed and he was right handed. He had pictures and video of him punching walls with both hands to show the difference (which looked oddly like the damage alleged). Second claimed he has never showered or used a toilet so the messy bathroom was a frame up job (admitted to using the toilet to dump oil/grease from his side job of selling fried food out of his apartment without a permit). Third declared he was a sovereign citizen and not subject to court jurisdiction. Then proceeds to read his list of criminal complaints against the landlord/city/court/judge. Finishes up by asking for the judge to order landlord to be subject to capital punishment, thereafter renounce his position/ turn himself in for arrest.

The judge asked if he was done and the man shouted that he was being illegally interrupted during his opening remarks which is a violation of his rights and freedom of religion. Pulled out a set of handcuffs he snuck into the hearing and walked to the bench yelling "You are under arrest under my birth right as a member of the free state for illegally enf... "He was cut off as six officers and a bailiff handcuffed him.

sxcamaro Report

Final score:

23points

POST

Joanne Lawrence 2 years ago

I sincerely hope the judge had the guy detained for a mental health evaluation.

17points

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#38

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Not a lawyer but when I was in high school I had the opportunity to observe in a court room. I was behind the judge's bench, so I wasn't visible to the rest of the room but there was a defendant that got screwed over by her own KID (9 yr old).

The judge had just issued her ruling and told the mom "this is your last chance and final warning. If you are back in front of me for the same reason you will get the fine!"

Before she brings the gavel down the kid blurts out: "WOW mom the last judge you had said the same thing!"

The defendant pales and tries to get the kid to shut up but the damage was done. Since the judge hadn't brought the gavel down she was able to reverse her ruling and what do ya know the mom was in her courtroom for the same damn charge. She got the fine.

Judge and I left the court room and absolutely lost it.

naranghim Report

Final score:

23points

POST

Kimi Tomminello 2 years ago

I did that to my mom when I was around 8. I told the judge that my mom was lying and that my dad did pay child support as my mom was testifying. I suffered greatly but I told the truth. She has hated me completely and totally since then and I have not had much contact with her since I left home at 16. Hopefully this mother doesn't take it out on the kid.

13points

#39

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Not my case, but my dad's. He was the equivalent of a Public Defender decades ago. There was this guy that would get caught for being drunk in public, public lewdness, etc. EVERY weekend. He seemed to draw the same judges and was pretty well known to everyone in the courthouse as an absolute lost cause. One of the "regular" judges had him appear in his court again. The judge is ready to give him a prison sentence because he was driving a car this time, but the guy starts crying that he finally got a job out of town and was trying to turn his life around. Judge tells him as long as he never makes a mistake "in my town again" he would just drop the charges.

Well sure as hell the guy shows up the following Monday. Same judge. Driving drunk AGAIN. My dad now has his case. The judge tells him he gave him his final chance, to which the guy sobs and replies "I was leaving town, your Honor. But my friends decided to throw me a going-away party." The judge was not amused. My dad had to do everything he could to not laugh.

TL;DR- Perpetual drunk that drove drunk gets a chance to leave town and not face charges, gets drunk at a going-away party in his honor, drives, goes to jail. Faced the same judge both times.

ZAWolfie Report

Final score:

22points

POST

Klorx 2 years ago

Is it bad I find this one pretty funny? Especially that ending.

11points

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#40

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court There’s a lawyer in my town who has a reputation for being a real jerk. He left a very successful firm to go off on his own. He and the firm negotiated which clients he would take, and how eventual fees from those clients would be divided. All seemed fine and dandy.

As soon as he’s out the door, he sues his old firm saying the deal is unenforceable and that he should 100% of the fees from the clients who came with him. He lost, and appealed, lost again and appealed to the state Supreme Court where they shut his a** down and, in extremely diplomatic language, pretty much called him a jerk.

Thirty_Helens_Agree Report

Final score:

21points

POST

Derpy_Greyh0und69 2 years ago

w h a t .

2points

#41

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court I charged a woman with reckless driving, when she ran someone off the road. She claimed it was accidental and they were both road raging at each other. I asked her specifically what she did, and she said and demonstrated that she was aggressively pointing at the other car.

As she demonstrated it she pointed with her right hand and pretended to have her left and on the steering wheel. As she jabbed at the air with her right hand, she a also was jerking the pretended steering wheel to the left toward where the other car would have been.

She took the case to trial, and did the same motions when the prosecutor asked her about it.

Judge found her guilty.

nelsonmavrick Report

Final score:

21points

POST

Klorx 2 years ago

😑

6points

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#42

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court I'm a paralegal.

The best situations are when we get a Sovereign Citizen (someone in the USA who thinks that the US laws do not apply to them for a vast variety of reasons) hire us but won't let us do anything on their case. We've had to actually fire a bunch of clients because they have gone against our 'rules' like - don't send a letter to the judge, don't write your own motions, don't announce that you're not Mark Smith because Mark Smith has capital letters and you were born with lower case letters, etc. Honestly, a whole thread on these people wouldn't be enough.

gnugnus Report

Final score:

19points

POST

WilvanderHeijden 2 years ago

Sovereign Citizens are at an unbelievable level of stupidity. They will argue that the law says that everyone has the right to travel and at the same they will fight the law that says that you have to have drivers license to drive a car. So they just pick and choose which laws apply to them and which laws don't. It may come as no surprise that they are exempt from laws which dictate them to pay taxes and do other unpleasant stuff.

20points

Woman Moves Out Of Parents' Home After They Asked Her To Give Her Space To Brother, They Freak Out

#43

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court This wasn’t my case but followed it closely because it was an acquaintance’s divorce proceedings. He and his now ex wife shared some commercial property that was worth some dough. They were both on the paperwork/ha access to the same info. Well some s**t hit the fan and the property was in arrears and I think some lien was filed. The husband would try to talk to his then wife about the whole thing and she would blow him off. Not only would she ignore him and the finances, she started cheating on him.

Fast forward to divorce. It’s contentious and they get down to fighting for the primary residence whose market value (unemcumbered) is much less than the commercial building. She demanded the house and the husband effectively offered to give her the commercial building if he could keep the residence. She never paid attention to how bad off the commercial building was and for some strange reason her lawyer didn’t do any due diligence so they took the deal.

I don’t know if the asset allocation included any saving conditions or caveats for the ex wife, but I did like to see that her own disinterest may have led to bargaining for an under water property instead of a paid off house.

TacoDoc Report

Final score:

19points

POST

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#44

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Knew a guy going through a divorce who’s wife had cheated on him. During the proceedings he liquidated his 401k and sold the house which was in his name. It was more than a million dollars.

He was a dual US/Romanian citizen, he just left for Romania a few days before their divorce was final with the money.

All she got was her BMW lease.

joecooool418 Report

Final score:

19points

POST

Hugh Cookson 2 years ago

ouch - the moral of this story is .......

6points

#45

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court I can’t remember the specifics of the story, but my mom is a lay magistrate but was working for a domestic violence service at one stage and had a client who was terminally ill and she advised them to change their will so their (possibly separated) abusive partner wouldn’t be entitled to anything when they passed away. Client passed away, abusive partner stormed into the law firm dealing with the will demanding to know where their share of the finances etc were and was simply told they’d been written out of the will and the case couldn’t be discussed with them.

ETA: best way to screw someone over rather than the worst, but hey

phoral Report

Final score:

18points

POST

Hugh Cookson 2 years ago

In parts of the World, writing a person out of the will can be challenged, in which case the only people who win are the lawyers ; a much better way is to leave the person the lowest possible amount (ie $1 or £1), therefore, you've left something, just not a huge chunk of your estate.

11points

Woman Refuses To Chip In For Babysitting Because She Doesn’t Even Have Kids, Asks If She’s A Jerk

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#46

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court This won't be the worst, but maybe it is from the guy's POV.

I am in Court for one of the first times after passing the bar exam and handling a routine child support case. The events that transpire do not involve my client from that day.

When one party is unrepresented in Family Court (in Massachusetts) there is a pre-trial meeting with the Probation Officers so they can assist the judge in framing the case. These Probation Officers are trained Social Workers who act as mediators in these instances, so nothing like criminal Probation Officers.

So these two parties are meeting. You can see the guy is just angry over everything but they are making progress working out the divorce. Then all of sudden he stands up and throws his chair over and yells "You took my house, you took my kids, you even took my f**king dog. I will kill you if you think you are keeping my name too you w***e!"

Within seconds he is restrained by court guards and escorted to a private room. He ended up being arrested for threatening to kill her. All because she wanted to keep his last name instead of going back to her maiden name to make it easier on the kids.

EDIT: For those wondering, the judge ended up moving forward that day with their case and she got everything she wanted. Him being arrested for Disorderly Conduct during the pre-trial meeting was held to be his fault for missing the Pre-Trial Conference, which means in Mass the judge can dissolve the marriage that day if one party is present and the other is not.

GenXStonerDad Report

Final score:

17points

POST

The Toast 2 years ago

i kinda feel bad for the dude he lost everything......

0points

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#47

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Not a lawyer but happened to me and some buddies in college.

So a group of friends and I rented a 5 bedroom house in college. And being the group of guys we were partied pretty hard and were really rough on the house. We knew going in we were not getting out deposit back.

Well part way though living there the septic started to have some problems whenever someone used the downstairs shower it would drain slowly, ie slowly fill as you used it. Also one of the rooms carpet would get wet. So we emailed the property service company to fix it. 2 weeks later they send out a plumber to snake the line and leave.

Well that didn't fix it, so we emailed again. 2-3 weeks, plumber, snake, leave. Still not fixed, email and 2-3 weeks and they scope the line. Turns out roots had grown into the line so they had to do a big ol process to completely remove all the roots. Now it's fixed.

Well we all move out, go or separate ways. One of my buddies goes to Australia for 9 months. When he gets back he comes home to a bunch of voicemails. Turns out the property company is coming after us for like 5 thousand on top of the deposit. They tried to pressure him into either paying the money or he would be taken to court. He told them he would see them in court.

For the couple months leading up to the court date he would get calls telling him to pay and it would all go away. Day before the first day of court they call him and tell him to pay 2k and give them info for one of the other people on the original lease. He says go to hell and see you in court.

First day of court is just to make sure everyone shows and to schedule the actual case. Lawyer for the property company shows up, is scrambling to figure out what is going on. Had no records beyond the original lease, which changed a couple times as people moved in and out. My buddy helps him out by giving him copies of the multiple emails that we sent to get them to fix the septic and the damage it did to the house. Told my buddy he would let us know how they wanted to proceed, never heard from the company again.

raidersofthelostpark Report

Final score:

16points

POST

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#48

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court A witness for the plaintiff in a civil suit, who was a co-worker of the plaintiff testified very strongly against the company and in favor of the plaintiff. I questioned her about bias toward the plaintiff, if they knew eachother well, were friends, etc. She said, no just friendly co-workers, "work friends" at best. I pinned her to it.

When I got a chance to cross-examine the plaintiff, she had no choice but to burn her witnesses credibility, because no only were they very close friends, but they had become sisters in law just a few years before. (no, they did not have the same last name or anything, but I had done my homework).

I still don't get why people want to fight small bias, by destroying their credibility, but ... it happens more than you'd think.

andthenhesaidrectum Report

Final score:

16points

POST

Seadog 2 years ago

Being an inlaw doesn't make you good friends. I'm sure everyone knows someone who absolutely hates at least one of their SO's family

3points

#49

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Sitting waiting for my client and the judge is giving a mass colloquy for an alternative program on a DUI. Basically probation.

Question - Has anyone consumed alcohol or taken drugs in the last 24 hours?

Obvious answer aside, one dude proudly raises his hand - "I smoked some dope last night..."

He did not get probation.

MrPGH Report

Final score:

16points

POST

Memere 2 years ago

It's probably just as well the dude told the truth - iirc, those programs usually do a drug test as a first step. He would have been caught right out of the gate!

7points

#50

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court I remember when I was a kid my dad got a ticket for running a stop sign. He decided to fight it because the stop sign was buried in a bush and wasn't visible from the road.

He and the police officer that had issued the ticket both arrived to court at the appointed time but the judge wasn't there. After they waited for about 20 minutes the bailiff finally apologized and told them they could go home and things would be rescheduled.

Just after they had left the judge finally arrived and found both my dad AND the police officer in contempt for leaving and 'wasting her time'.

One $80 traffic ticket became two $500 contempt of court fines.

About five years later a friend of mine pulled the same judge for a DUI (prescription not booze, he didn't realize he shouldn't be driving on them). He just went without any council. He said that she said if he was stupid enough to try to represent himself he could sit there and not say anything so he ended up just sitting there and not saying anything and lost his license for a first offense DUI.

There were more than one news article and letters to the editor about what a disaster of a judge she was so I'm sure a lot of other people had similar issues with her.

varthalon Report

Final score:

15points

POST

TheElementalGod️️ 1 year ago

Would the judge who was late acually be ALLOWED to fine people for leaving when the judge didnt show up

1point

#51

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Child Protective investigator, I had a client who wanted to emancipate herself from her family. She was an entitled brat. Wanted to live with her drug dealing boyfriend. Judge began asking her for her pay stubs, plans, documents for said plans, assess to transportation. The brat had none of that figured out. Court ordered to give up her phone to prevent access to the drug dealers and court ordered to get a job, make plans to rent an apartment on her own. Everything she wanted......if not, she would be house in DJJ as her parent could no longer take care of her after she beat and attempted to hurt them multiple times. She didn't last 5 minutes under her court order after telling the judge he didn't understand and he was being mean. Upon her release from DJJ, she was still court ordered to do everything in order to emancipate herself. The judge was not a having it that day.

Final score:

15points

POST

WilvanderHeijden 2 years ago

There was an episode of one of those real live court shows where a girl sued her parents for money for tuition, rent and cost of living because the parents wouldn't pay for her deadbeat drug addicted boy friend. Her lawyer even said that it was the child's right to do whatever she wanted. The judge told her that she was delusional and that the parents couldn't be forced to help their child to destroy her future. After this the girl ditched the boyfriend and went back to live with her parents.

10points

#52

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court IANAL but my ex screwed herself over pretty good in our divorce proceeding.

Right after we had separated, we both had to move in with family. School wasn't in session and we didn't have any custody agreement yet, so we had been swapping the kids every week. Then one day while the kids were with her, she emails me and tells me that she had enrolled the kids in a school near her. As soon as I got that email from her, I went to my attorney. He filed a motion with the court to get a temporary custody order until we finished the divorce. When he got the date for the hearing, he sent my ex the proper notification, filed it with the court, etc. The day of the hearing, we're waiting in court for her to show up, and she never does. So the judge gave me temporary custody of my kids. Which eventually became full custody once our divorce was finalized.

I later found out that the reason she didn't show up was that she had the idea that somehow my attorney was trying to trick her. So she called the court about the hearing date, but says she was told a different, later day. The date of which fell on a Sunday.

It still boggles my mind. I mean, if you're going to trick someone into going to court on the wrong date (ignoring the fact that an attorney would probably get disbarred for intentionally doing so), why would you pick an earlier date than the actual date? And why would you not just show up anyway? If the date was fake, she still could've made the real date. And if it was real, she wouldn't miss it. And don't you write important appointments on a calendar so you don't forget? How do you not see that it's on a Sunday and say "hmm....that's not right."

Oh, and the kicker? She never actually tried to enroll my kids in a school near her. Turns out, she just said it because she was pissed about something I'd said (I don't even remember what).

SonOfDadOfSam Report

Final score:

14points

POST

#53

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Not a specific person but I work family law and get a lot of cases that involve domestic violence. I have listened to women describe the most awful, horrifying things that have been inflicted on them and their children, and have on more than one occasion just sat and cried once they’ve left my office.

Now first let me say these are few and far between and we should take women seriously when they allege they’ve been abused. But nothing makes me more mad than when a woman lies about abuse to keep a good husband and father from his kids.

I have one where I represent the dad and there is enough evidence to prove she’s lying pretty conclusively, she has even suggested strongly to her MiL that he didn’t touch her, but she can’t actually redact it because there are pending criminal charges and I think she’s dug herself too deep to get out of the lie. And he hasn’t seen his kids in months while we try and arrange supervised visits.

fueledbychelsea Report

Final score:

14points

POST

T Lee Mac 2 years ago

Bitches like that piss me off.

1point

#54

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court I had a client who was accused of a very nasty sexual offence. He had an alibi--he was at work, where he was the boss. He had an employee who could absolutely vouch for his being there. I talked to the employee, employee confirmed this.

It gets closer to the trial, and around the time when I need to send in an "alibi notice", which is advance notice to the Crown so that they can investigate the alibi and determine whether or not it's true. But, I am being careful, so I call the employee up again.

Turns out my client fired him in the interim, and so the employee quite candidly tells me, "Oh, yeah, he was definitely at work. But that's not what I'll say in court. F**k that guy, he is going down."

I did not call him as a witness, or file the alibi notice.

Still won the trial, but if I hadn't thought to call the guy, or if he'd been less candid, my client would have been f**ked hard. Sex offender registry, jail time, the works. Completely innocent.

varsil Report

Final score:

13points

POST

An Co 2 years ago

What total moron fires the guy that is his alibi before he testifies? If that happened in a movie, I would walk out in disbelief.

12points

#55

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court In a case where a semitruck driver ran over and killed a grandma and her daughter (leaving 2 kids without any family), the defense attorney said: “really, the semitruck driver is the victim here because he has to live with what he is done.”

Final score:

13points

POST

Hugh Cookson 2 years ago

It's never that black and white .... did they run out in front of him, did he have to swerve to miss a car load of people, did his truck have a catastrophic tyre blow out or an engine seizure , what ? Full disclosure is needed before making sweeping statements like this.

10points

#56

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court I'm not a lawyer, but I was a jury foreman on a case about five years back. Guy was accused of attempting to kill his girlfriend. Various charges about the severity were filed. However, victim's testimony wasn't terribly convincing, especially after cross, and there was only evidence that something had happened in the house that night, but not necessarily that the boyfriend had done it.

Anyway, it's defense's turn to present, and they unexpectedly recess for the day. We come back the next day, and the defendant testifies. He puts himself at the scene and admits to hitting her. We ended up convicting him of everything but attempted murder, if I remember right.

Afterward, the judge came into the jury room and told us that the unexpected recess the previous day was because the defendant insisted on testifying against his lawyer and the judge's advice. If he hadn't testified, basically no chance we would have convicted him.

etherag Report

Final score:

12points

POST

Ace Girl 2 years ago

Why would the judge be giving the abuser advice on how to not get caught?

1point

#57

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Lady brought a frivolous case to get out of a contract she signed. She lost, then sued the attorney and the witnesses for conspiring against her. They got her case dismissed and an award of attorneys fees which she refused to pay. Lawyer recorded it as a lien on her house and scheduled a foreclosure sale, which caused her mortgage lender to declare a default and accelerate entire mortgage balance. Lawyer made a side deal with lender to pay them all proceeds of the sale and then sold her house on courthouse steps to highest bidder and then arranged for sheriff to forcibly eject her onto the street with her s**t. She's homeless now.

Short story: honor your contracts and don't sue your lawyer when you don't.

219Infinity Report

Final score:

12points

POST

Cold Contagious 2 years ago

I know she didn't use the best judgment and makes bad decisions, but dâmn she's homeless now, I guess he showed her.../s

3points

#58

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Paralegal here- we had a client show up to court ordered mediation several hours late... straight from a lake trip.

Part of my job is to call clients a day or two before these kinds of things to remind them of the importance of the hearing. I told her specifically "It is vital that you show up on time, dressed appropriately".

When she did show up my boss took one look at her and said "you understand we have to take whatever offer they give us, right? Because there is no way I'm taking you to trial."

ButternutSquawk Report

Final score:

12points

POST

#59

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Now a lawyer, but a friend properly screwed over his ex wife. He thought things were not going well. She seemed off. He did a little digging, and saw enough to prove she was cheating. He hired a private detective. The detective got pics of her kissing a dude, going to his house, plus the cell phone call log, credit card statements, etc. Then...SHE asks for a divorce and claims he is being unfaithful. She claims she has been nothing but a loving wife, yet provides no proof he is cheating. He pulls out a 3 inch binder with a couple month log, photos of her going into restaurants with her boyfriend, pictures kissing him in the parking lot, pictures of her car at his place, text log, etc, etc, etc.

Both married people had equally high paying jobs. She wanted to take him to the ringer. He threw out some offer like 25K cash, and nothing else, no retirement funds, no house, to child support, etc, plus he wanted the kids. Basically take 25K and walk b***h! Her lawyer told her she better take it, and she did.

somedude456 Report

Final score:

12points

POST

Joanne Lawrence 2 years ago

This is interesting to me. I'd like to know where the law comes down on adultery wherever this happened. Where I live, a claim of adultery is only relevant to expediting a divorce, as we have what I'd call true no-fault divorce. So if they just filed for divorce and cited irreconcilable differences, they have to live apart for 6 months before the divorce is finalized. If there's adultery or abuse involved, there is no such time requirement, but there's no other punitive consequences to the a-hole party.

5points

#60

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court I have been in dispute with British Gas for around 10 years, every now and again they take me to court, every time I win and we go away for another few years.

The last time I lawyered up, it's in a Magistrates even though it's a civil matter. My solicitor waited for the British Gas guy to swear his oath to tell the truth the whole truth etc. then asked him what he knew of the previous court cases. When the guy said he didn't know anything about them my solicitor ripped into him saying he'd just claimed to tell the whole truth so clearly nothing he says can be trusted, it went on for a few minutes, it was kind of brutal. The Magistrates agreed and we walked away with £600 in costs.

It was a joy to watch this bloke who was all, "we're coming to make entry to your house and the police will help" before we went in be told to sit down and not say anything else unless he was asked a question.

To fend off some of the questions, it's to do with a disconnected meter at my house (for electric to a closed shop) - I have written to the CEO, I've had my MP involved and been to court four times. British Gas don't change, don't listen so I've given up. I'll just go to court every now and again and claim my £600.

EDIT - I just remembered, they had to transfer the money electronically as we were going to send the bailiffs in as they took 27 days to pay! TBH I was a little disappointed when they paid up.

a1acrity Report

Final score:

11points

POST

Robert Trebor 2 years ago

Back in the 90's I had cable tv, and because I wasn't watching much (still don't), and because they raised the rate, I called and told them to cut me off. They didn't, so I disconnected their cable from my house the simple way: scissors. Called them to tell them to get their cable off my property. They didn't. Weeks later the guy driving their sniffer truck sees me in my yard and accuses me of theft of service. I told him to look and see that their cable was hanging free, not connected. I told him to get the cable off my property NOW. He did. I went around to the cable office to ask why they had such morons working for them. Got a formal letter of apology.

8points

#61

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Basically all custody battles where neither parent is a legitimately horrible person/parent everyone is better off* without.

The kids always get screwed.

YouKnowItWell Report

Final score:

11points

POST

#62

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Used to work in children's court representing parents. When I first started, I witnessed another attorney destroy any chance of their client getting their kids back. At a review hearing assessing whether the court should terminate parental rights, the attorney was so confused about what was happening that they requested unmonitored visits for their client, but didn't even address termination of rights. Needless to say the court terminated the client's parental rights. The worst part was that earlier that day, the court took up a petition for more time, but denied it after the attorney failed to make any argument. Based on the facts (parent was doing really well), they probably would have won. The second worst part was overhearing the attorney tell her client to come back for the next review hearing (finalizing the adoption). Not only would there be nothing the parent could do at that hearing, but terminated parents aren't even allowed to be there.

daitaiming Report

Final score:

11points

POST

Ace Girl 2 years ago

This shouldn't be allowed to happen. Heartbreaking. I would die if this happened to me!

6points

#63

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Not court, but Live PD traffic stop I was watching and the guy told the officer “I have caffeine pills in my back pocket” gets them out puts them on the hood, everyone’s chill... dude then comes clean and says it’s Molly and the officers look at each other and go “do we even have a test kit for that?” other officer says “no” dudes face just shows he should have kept his mouth shut.

BAMyouhavetheclap Report

Final score:

10points

POST

and_a_touch_of_the_’tism 1 year ago

What’s Molly?

1point

#64

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Had a criminal jury trial for misdemeanor Criminal Mischief over 4 years ago. State filed charges and kept amending the Information to the point where they left the ACTUAL VICTIM out of the trial and proceeded with the two eyewitnesses. Well, one of the witnesses was my client's ex and the other witness was the ex's new GF. They claimed my client vandalized the ACTUAL VICTIM's car. Client denied everything.

Well, apparently, the State and both Witnesses had no idea that the Ex had a outstanding warrant for not paying child support to MY CLIENT which created a motive for him to lie. Asked him if he was aware that he had a warrant out for his arrest on the stand. He didn't know. The Judge excused the jurors. The bailiffs arrested the Ex on the stand. State rested. Judge granted our Motion for Judgment of Acquittal because we had good case law for the victim not being there. Client walked away free and the Ex went to jail.

bobbydigital_ftw Report

Final score:

10points

POST

Guy MacGregor 2 years ago

Unrelated, but the picture show Montreal (Québec, Canada) police officers circa 2015. If anyone were wondering.

7points

SweatCleansTheSuit Report

#65

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court I've seen a parent use non-existent discipline as a tool to win over their teenage child, so that the child will choose to live with said rubbish parent, and rubbish parent will receive child support from the other parent.

It boils my blood seeing someone allowing their 15 old child to drop out of school, get high everyday, buy them drugs, alcohol, just about every negative thing you could do to a kid, just so they don't have to pay $100 in child support a month.

edit: for everyone commenting on the fact that the child support payments were so cheap, child support amounts in my jurisdiction are relative based upon the paying parenting's situation, income, schooling, assets, etc. They were deadbeats, part time under the table seasonal employment and government welfare.

Final score:

10points

POST

#66

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court I was a very new lawyer, with no bankruptcy experience. A partner sent me to bankruptcy court to try to make a claim as a creditor related to a $50 million building that was being sold.

Time and lack of knowledge will prevent me from accurately describing everything that went down but I will do my best.

The Court handled my client's claim very quickly and easily at first. The Court ruled we were not a creditor because our claim was against a tenant, which was correct. (Note, we had purchased the claim from someone merely to try to somehow wedge our way into buying the property - which was very transparent to the Court.)

So I could just set back for the remainder of the hearing and watch the 2 premier bankruptcy attorneys go at it. One represented the debtor and the owner of the building; the other represented a secured creditor with a lien against the building

They absolutely hated each other on a personal level, and were arguing with great venom about the plan to sell the real estate.

There was a small break in the action while the judge took care of another matter.

When we came back, the secured creditor attorney told the Court the following:

His client (the creditor) had purchased controlling interest in the debtor (the owner of the building).

He had been directed to fire the other attorney.

He had been directed to withdraw the motion to sell the real estate.

He then did both there in the Courtroom.

I have practiced for almost 3 decades. It was the most bad a** thing I had ever seen, and was particularly noteworthy because the courtroom was packed with other attorneys watching and those 2 attorneys absolutely hated each other.

FountainofR Report

Final score:

9points

POST

Willowbilly 2 years ago

Huh?

0points

#67

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court My best friend's dad. He left his mom when he was 50 for a 32yo. On a Christmas dinner my friend, his brother and the dad have a discussion and the girl decides she needs to be involved. Things heat up and she throws my friends phone through the windows, so he gets her laptop and does the same and then him and his brother leave the house. A week later he gets a court notice asking him to appear in front of the judge for assault on the girl. She told the police they beat her. His dad declared it was true. Luckily they had no evidence so they dismissed the case. His brother is getting married this week and his father won't be present.

Fulk0 Report

Final score:

9points

POST

Ian Webling 2 years ago

Thirty-two is a woman, not a girl.

5points

#68

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Saw a guy with a good job (around 120K/year) adopt his new wife's FIVE children. Six months later she files for divorce and guess who is on the hook for child support for five?

Makeelee Report

Final score:

9points

POST

Kathryn Baylis 2 years ago (edited)

He should go for custody and cut the gold digger loose. The timing is way too suspect. Also sounds like the plot of a little known movie (“Author, Author”).

6points

#69

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Wasn't there one where in a divorce case the husband asked to have custody of their pet cats and the wife had them put down out of spite?

Ghenges Report

Final score:

9points

POST

Julia Cargile 2 years ago

May she rot in hell.

28points

#70

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court Here in Missouri a Golden Corral is being sued for the death of a elderly man. He was choking and manager asked if anyone could help. An employee waved their hand and said they could. The manager stopped them and sent them away. The man died obviously. The stupid part here is the corporate lawyers defense to have case tossed is they didn’t owe that man any aid and he died from his own fault for not cutting his food up into smaller pieces. The case is tragic but the lawyers defense is just outright rude and will cost them if it goes to trial.

Bamafan6566 Report

Final score:

7points

POST

Douglas Mock 2 years ago

Hope Golden Corral loses that one.

8points

#71

Lawyers Are Sharing 30 Fails They’ve Witnessed In Court I am not a lawyer but I heard a story about a woman who had her soon to be ex-husband over during a custody battle and seduced him by getting him heavily intoxicated. She led him out to his car, sat him in the drivers seat and then called the police. He got a DWI and lost his parental rights.

youbetchamom Report

Final score:

7points

POST

Douglas Mock 2 years ago

He's a dumbf*ck

6points