Thread: really need help, being sued by discover

I am really in a bind and now somewhat scared of this. I received notice back in about Feb of this year that my Discover account was closed. I had stopped paying them in late Sept/Oct. In June, I was served a civil notice that I was being sued by a credit lawyer that says he represents him. I signed and returned. I received a letter about mid July to contact one of the creditors in their office, they had permission to act on behalf of Discover to resolve this. Then I received a call on August 16th at 8:45pm from their office requesting to talk to me to settle this. Now, today, I received official "looking" papers in the mail from the lawyers offices that are dated August 18th stating that since I never denied the debt or took any legal action to defend myself, they were going for a "motion for judgement on the pleadings" based on this that and the other legal terms.
OK, this is where I am confused. I thought denial came before being served and that there was no motion after the fact except for discovery. In the intial serve papers, they included a photocopy of discover's terms with no signature. And that request for jugement could not be asked for if i requested a trial date. In my resonce, i was ambiguous and requested a trial date.
I am broke. There is no house in my name, no car (the one I drive is 11 years old but not in my name) the only bank account I have is as an adult guardian for my minor children's accounts. My income is @ $ 100-125 per week. I get no assistance from the state nor any other income, although legally I am married.
The total amount the lawyers state they want to collect is the principle sum of $8330.04, attorney's fees $858.00 and court costs $255.00.
My story about Discover is not a woe is me. I had not been using the card but was making weekly payments toward the principle to cut it down for months. Then they jacked up the interest rate which jacked up my minimum monthly payment which sent me into late fees and higher interest rates. I couldn't keep up and the amount kept getting higher. Eventually, they even lowered my credit limit which now my balance was higher than and that incurred more fees, etc...
I did contact Discover several times to try and work something out. They would not work with me and said I didn't qualify for any programs as I was unemployed and did not collect unemployment. They would tell me to make a lump payment and then they would wave a late payment for a month and then come back at me. It was so upside down and backwards, I stopped making payments. I know it is not an excuse, it is just the backstory.

I'm sorry to hear about your situation. Whatever you do, don't ignore the suit any longer and let them get a summary judgement against you. You need to respond yourself or find a good lawyer to respond for you.

OK, and thank you for the response. I cannot afford a lawyer so what stepps should I be taking? I have answered the initial civil suit, now what am I supposed to do? Do I find a form for some sort of request of proof? Or can I type up a denial letter? I am really lost now. Any help is appreciated.

Originally Posted by debtdelima

OK, and thank you for the response. I cannot afford a lawyer so what steps should I be taking? I have answered the initial civil suit, now what am I supposed to do? Do I find a form for some sort of request of proof? Or can I type up a denial letter? I am really lost now. Any help is appreciated.

Sorry to hear about your problems as well. But I can also see that regardless of what you do about the lawsuit I would strongly advise that you get your name off of the account(s) for your children or they will soon be as broke as you are. Yes, they can grab the money in children's accounts if they get a judgment and find your name on any bank accounts anywhere. Makes no difference that it isn't your money. Your name is on the account so that makes it your money. So whatever you do get your name off of your children's accounts and let some other adult handle it for you. If your name is on a spouse's account or you let your funds get mixed up with a spouse's accounts their money can be grabbed too.

You say you answered the initial civil suit. How did you answer it? What exactly did you say in your answer? Can you type up a denial letter? I think your response to the court should have been a denial but not in a letter format.

You say you answered the initial civil suit. How did you answer it? What exactly did you say in your answer? Can you type up a denial letter? I think your response to the court should have been a denial but not in a letter format.

OK, so I was intially VERY naive about the process and was informed by the court clerk that I needed to write a response as well as bringing in the summons. She actually gave me a sheet of paper and to include my answer to the civil summons with my name, address and the civil case #. I stated the following (slightly paraphrasing):
Dear sirs, With regards to the civil case #123-456, I (name here) do hereby agree to a court date.
Signed by me
The clerk stamped it, copied it and returned the original and told me to mail it out. I believed at this point I could not use the denial statement as they had filed the suit and served me. I thought denial and validation were when dealing with creditors. The company is Fred Hanna and is listed as a lawyer as well as creditor. They have no lawyers (creditors) making contact with me to settle and then send me papers signed by lawyers about filing for summary judgement. They say they represent and are working on behalf of Discover card.
I do thank you for the information about removing my name from any accounts regarding my children.

"You say you answered the initial civil suit. How did you answer it? What exactly did you say in your answer? Can you type up a denial letter? I think your response to the court should have been a denial but not in a letter format."

OK, so I was intially VERY naive about the process and was informed by the court clerk that I needed to write a response as well as bringing in the summons. She actually gave me a sheet of paper and to include my answer to the civil summons with my name, address and the civil case #. I stated the following (slightly paraphrasing):
Dear sirs, With regards to the civil case #123-456, I (name here) do hereby agree to a court date.
Signed by me
The clerk stamped it, copied it and returned the original and told me to mail it out. I believed at this point I could not use the denial statement as they had filed the suit and served me. I thought denial and validation were when dealing with creditors. The company is Fred Hanna and is listed as a lawyer as well as creditor. They have no lawyers (creditors) making contact with me to settle and then send me papers signed by lawyers about filing for summary judgement. They say they represent and are working on behalf of Discover card.
I do thank you for the information about removing my name from any accounts regarding my children.

Originally Posted by debtdelima

OK, so I was intially VERY naive about the process and was informed by the court clerk that I needed to write a response as well as bringing in the summons.

What the heck did they want your copy of the summons for? Never heard of a court yet that ever wanted the summons.

She actually gave me a sheet of paper and to include my answer to the civil summons with my name, address and the civil case #. I stated the following (slightly paraphrasing):
Dear sirs, With regards to the civil case #123-456, I (name here) do hereby agree to a court date.
Signed by me

Well, it sounds like you didn't admit anything and that's great.

The clerk stamped it, copied it and returned the original and told me to mail it out. I believed at this point I could not use the denial statement as they had filed the suit and served me. I thought denial and validation were when dealing with creditors.

I've thought lots of things that later proved to be wrong.

The company is Fred Hanna and is listed as a lawyer as well as creditor. They have no lawyers (creditors) making contact with me to settle and then send me papers signed by lawyers about filing for summary judgment. They say they represent and are working on behalf of Discover card.

Fred Hanna, eh? Some of the worst creeps out there. What do you mean by lawyer as well as creditor? They can't be considered to be creditors under any circumstances. I've got a dumb lawyer here in OKC trying to spoon feed me some malarkey about they aren't a party to the lawsuit so they can't be held accountable under FDCPA for any alleged violations. They will get their wake up call a little later on down the line. It will be a rude awakening indeed. (LOL)

So have they filed motion for summary judgment or not? If so, it probably won't come anywhere close to meeting the requirements of Twombly so if I were in your shoes I think I'd try to use Twombly to stall them off from getting the judgment and then go for discovery. If the judge wants to ignore that plea I'd probably move to appellate and argue Twombly there. But that's me and I know how to do it and you most likely don't even have a clue as to what the Twombly decision had to say or how to argue it.

A greatly simplified explanation of Twombly is that it was a U.S. Supreme Court decision which says that all pleadings, both civil and criminal must be crafted so that all of the statements are fully stated and backed up with proof or they won't hold up anymore. That's the nuts and bolts of Twombly stripped right down to the bare threads. In order to meet those requirements the pleading party must know all the elements of a cause of action and make absolutely certain that they are all present and accounted for in just about every type of statement. If you don't do that your case will most likely be dismissed and that is especially true at the federal level. Local courts will probably continue to run on down the road about as sloppy as ever.