Although federal court requires an additional document, a civil action cover sheet, generally, you need only two documents to start a lawsuit. In most instances, those documents are a summons and a Continue reading The Summons and Complaint
Category Archives: Pleadings
Starting a Lawsuit: The Filing of a Summons and Complaint
In practical terms, the starting of a lawsuit is an easy step. The plaintiff or someone on behalf of the plaintiff, takes the original, and an appropriate number of copies of the summons and complaint to the clerk of the court, and presents these documents and the filing fee. The clerk’s office takes Continue reading Starting a Lawsuit: The Filing of a Summons and Complaint
Notice to the Other Party: Service of the Summons and Complaint
The next step in litigation after starting the lawsuit is to give notice to the party being sued, the defendant, of the lawsuit. In broad terms, this would seem to be a simple step. After all, in serving the summons and complaint, the plaintiff is only delivering a copy of those documents to the defendant. However, there are elaborate rules governing this step, and this step Continue reading Notice to the Other Party: Service of the Summons and Complaint
The Content of an Answer: Affirmative Defenses
In addition to responding to each allegation in a complaint, an answer might also, and usually does, include affirmative defenses. You might think of an affirmative defense as Continue reading The Content of an Answer: Affirmative Defenses
The Content of an Answer: Counterclaims and the Reply
In addition to responding to each allegation in a complaint, an answer might also include counterclaims. When a defendant raises a counterclaim against a plaintiff, the defendant is Continue reading The Content of an Answer: Counterclaims and the Reply
The Content of an Answer: Third-Party Claims
Sometimes, when a defendant gets a complaint, the defendant wants to say: What happened to the plaintiff isn’t my fault. It is the fault of another party. The defendant might raise this argument as an affirmative defense, or the defendant might Continue reading The Content of an Answer: Third-Party Claims
The Defendant’s Response: A Motion to Dismiss
Although there are those who would have you believe otherwise, the law simply does not provide a remedy for every type of grievance that can arise when there are enough people interacting with one another. However, that does not prevent people from starting lawsuits based on the most ludicrous set of facts. The fact is that you can start a lawsuit at anytime for anything, but that does not mean you will win that lawsuit. The first point at which a defendant can challenge the adequacy of a lawsuit is Continue reading The Defendant’s Response: A Motion to Dismiss
The Defendant’s Response: The Answer
Once the defendant receives a copy of the summons and complaint, the defendant is supposed to prepare, and then serve and file a document called an Answer. The answer is a rather simple document in which the defendant simply addresses each allegation in the complaint. The idea is for the defendant to Continue reading The Defendant’s Response: The Answer
An Overview of the Pleadings Stage of Litigation
The pleadings step is the first step or stage of litigation. It involves several sub-steps: (1) the preparation of a Continue reading An Overview of the Pleadings Stage of Litigation