An Overview Of Civil Lawsuits

If you were taking a legal action or a lawsuit for a wrongful act, it would be identified as either a "civil" or a "criminal" suit. Comparing these two forms, criminal actions, as it connotes, deal with certain violations of the criminal laws and highlights an individual's relationship with society, as a whole. On the other hand, civil lawsuits involve an individual, group or company's relationship with another individual, group or company.

While many of the criminal acts also involve civil actions, not all of the civil lawsuits involve acts of a criminal nature.

Various matters could be dealt with through civil actions. Here are several:

• Personal injury
- negligence
- auto accidents
- slip and fall
- premises liability
- product liability
- battery and assault
- emotional distress

• business/commercial disputes
- breach of contract
- fraud
- real estate litigation
- breach of real estate contract
- corporate and partnership dissolutions
- intellectual property rights

• labor and employment matters
- unfair labor practices
- wrongful termination
- discrimination

• jury and non-jury trials
• judicial arbitration
• theft / conversion
• trespass

Parties involved in a civil action

Plaintiff – the person, group or company initiating the civil lawsuit or the one who files the complaint with the court clerk

Defendant – the person, group or company who will defend itself from the civil action and must respond to the plaintiff's complaint, on a limited period prescribed by filing his/her answer to the court clerk

Real party in interest – the party which will directly be affected (either beneficial or not) by the conclusion of the civil case.

Other figures that may become involved:

- "Capacity of parties"
- "Substitution of parties"

Procedures involved in civil lawsuits

In civil actions, no two cases are alike. The procedures of dealing with such vary depending on the nature, and complexity of the evidentiary and legal issues involved. However, here is a very common framework of the steps in a filing a civil lawsuit:

1. Filing of complaint – every civil case begin when one party files and serves a "Summons and Complaint". The complaint identifies the "causes of action" or the reason for filing the complaint.

2. Service of complaint – this procedure involves the serving of complaint on defendant(s). The defendant(s) may sign an "Acknowledgment of Service" if he/she accepts the service. Otherwise, it will be served formally.

3. Response to Complaint – answer of defendant to the complaint served or issue a plead to challenge sufficiency of the plaintiff's complaint called "Demurrer" or "Motion to Strike"

4. Hearing of Challenges to the Sufficiency of Complaint – if the defendant filed a demurrer or a motion to strike, the motions given by the defendant must be heard and judged before the main issue of the civil action could proceed.

This process may take a period of 2 months and if sustained, the court would grant leave to plaintiff for amendment of Complaint. The plaintiff will have to draft a new complaint and the whole process starts over again.

5. Discovery – involves the presentation of necessary evidences for the prosecution of both sides in the case. Discovery motions would be applicable if one side refused or failed to comply with the discovery requests.

Article Source: http://www.articleshelf.com

Lawyers & How They Negotiate Personal Injury Settlements

By: Aurel Radulescu

If you have recently been injured in an accident through no fault of your own, you may find yourself in a sea of lawyers without knowing which one to choose. After being injured, many individuals turn to lawyers for help in protecting their rights and helping to ensure they are fairly compensated for lost wages, medical bills and pain and suffering.

Depending on the accident, medical attention may or may not be required. In an automobile accident, for example, the individual who caused the accident will be responsible for any repairs to the victim’s automobile, along with the previously mentioned compensation. Most individuals hire a lawyer soon after the accident occurs even though settlement negotiations will typically not begin until after medical treatment has ended.

After concluding medical treatment, lawyers will begin to negotiate with the insurance company representing the person who caused the accident. During this time, lawyers will assess the amount of medical bills, doctor reports and diagnosis, lost wages, damages and will attempt to estimate a fair amount of pain and suffering. After gaining your approval, personal injury lawyers will submit a proposal to the insurance adjuster for consideration. It generally takes 30 days for a response, which is expected to be a counteroffer. At this time, lawyers will discuss the offer with their client and see if a fair settlement can be reached. If not, the lawyer will prepare another letter explaining that the adjuster’s offer is not acceptable and will, once again, request that the case be settled for a slightly lower amount than the original proposed amount. This situation is a test of each side as the adjuster wants to settle the case for as little as possible while the lawyers want to make sure their clients are properly compensated. After several letters back and forth, and perhaps some telephone calls, the lawyers will advise their client when a fair offer has been reached. While they cannot instruct their client on what to do, they can advise them on the fairness of the offer and how that figure may change if the case were to proceed to trial.

For reasons of both time and expense, the majority of personal injury cases are settled out of court. Once a trial is granted, attorney fees and court costs increase dramatically. An attorney receives a pre-negotiated amount of the client’s settlement, but receives a larger percentage if the case moves to trial. There are a number of lawyers who handle personal injury cases and it is always important to select one that is most sincere and seems most knowledgeable about the process.

The information in this article is to be used for informational purposes only. It should not be considered as, or used in place of, professional legal advice. Individuals who need legal help should consult one of the lawyers in their area who can assist them with their questions and concerns.

Article Source: http://articles-galore.com


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You Cannot Outrun The Long Arm Of The Law!

By: Dwight Brown

A man has been sentenced to jail for using spyware to gain unauthorised access to US government computers.

Kenneth Kwak, a 34-year-old system auditor who had been working on the computer security of the US Department of Education, admitted placing spyware software on his supervisor's PC.

This software enabled him to access emails and other information. Kwak, of Chantilly, Virginia, then shared the information he gathered with others in his office at the government department.

US District Judge Royce Lamberth sentenced Kwak to five months in prison, followed by five months of electronically monitored home confinement. He has also been ordered to pay the US government $40,000 (£21,270), and will be on probation for three years.

"The US Government has adopted a zero tolerance policy regarding intrusions into its computer systems," said Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant for Sophos . "A clear message is being sent out to its staff that hacks like this are not just unacceptable but also criminal.

"Kwak should be thankful that no evidence was found that his hack was financially motivated, as that surely saved him from a stiffer jail term," continued Cluley.

Cluley said this was a timely reminder that organisations should put measures in place to reduce the risks.

These involved not only external attacks by malware and internet hackers, but also of potential problems with disgruntled staff or those with a financial motive in mind.

The annual Web@Work survey, conducted by Harris Interactive for the security firm Websense, found that the number of companies reporting spyware infestations had jumped 50 percent in the last year alone, and now nearly 92 percent of companies report that they have found spyware on their networks (websense).

Spyware is a somewhat loose term, and can mean anything from often innocuous Web cookies to Trojan programs that can hijack a computer.

But more dangerous varieties of spyware are on the rise, said Michael Newman, a vice president at Websense. He told John Gordon of "Future Tense" on American Public Media (futuretense.publicradio.org) that information technology managers were increasingly finding keylogging software on their systems. This "particularly malicious" type of spyware detects every keystroke made on a computer and can pick up passwords and other sensitive information, Mr. Newman said.

Pornography sites are among the most dangerous, with many of them replete with pop-up ads and spyware. The good news is that the number of employees reported to have visited a porn site at work dropped to 12 percent from 17 percent the last year. Of those, 95 percent said their visits to porn sites were "accidental." Whoops!

Meanwhile, SiteAdvisor, the Web safety service recently acquired by the security firm McAfee, reported this week that search engines offered little protection from dangerous sites. This includes paid and unpaid search results. In fact, SiteAdvisor found, sponsored results on average contain two to four times the number of malicious sites as do regular results.

Some of the most popular kinds of searches lead Internet users to dangerous sites, SiteAdvisor reported. Often, the sites offer downloads like file-sharing software and screensavers that contain malicious programs. Up to 72 percent of the results from keywords like "Bearshare" or "screensaver" lead to sites that pose a risk.

A Victory for Spammers Another problem besetting Internet users, spam, may get slightly worse with this week's news that Blue Frog, an anti-spam service offered by the company Blue Security, was shut down after a fatal cyberattack from spammers.

Blue Frog worked like this: Clients would lodge a complaint, and Blue Security would request that spammers stop sending e-mail to the client. If that failed, Blue Security would fill in forms on the spammers' Web sites asking that their clients' names be removed — often crippling the spammers' systems with an overload of data.

Article Source: http://articles-galore.com


Dwight Brown writes about Spyware on his Blog Adware Spyware Remover