Ok guys, here's a question: Thanks to Breeze for posting that public records database thing, I found out that there is a judgement against me for $1599.00 for an apartment that I had to vacate due to unlivable conditions. I left before the lease was up. The judgement is not reporting on any bureau as of today and the judgement was filed in 1998. If I satisfy this judgement will it appear on my report or should I just let sleeping dogs lie? Thanks.
If you were never served, you can probably have it vacated. You can go to the courthouse and look at the file. Don't do anything that requires a background investigation i.e. large insurance policies, certain types of jobs, until you get it cleared up. A search of public records is part of a background investigation. breeze
What do you mean? You mean if I have a judgement that I was never served on, I can have it vacated? I have a jugement from a Dentist of unethical repute. He charged me for Crowns that I did not authorize. He billed my insurance company then billed me. I refused to pay as I told him I needed to wait on the crowns. A few months ago I discovered the judgement. I was never served any papers, never really was notified about any court date. Not even served papers. How would I go about "vacating" a judgement? I didn't even know you could do such a thing..I thought once it was in the books it was in the books.
Re: Judgment Not reporting Erica: Judgments typically remain alive for a very, very long time, and will be searched for if, for example, you are going to buy or sell real estate in the state and are getting title insurance (i.e., getting a mortgage). So I'd say that you need to get this taken care of one way or the other. If you weren't served properly, you may be able to have the judgment vacated. You'd need to go to the courthouse, look in the file and see how they say they served you. Before you go ahead and try for a vacatur, though, you need to decide what you want to do about the underlying debt. If you want to try to get out of paying it, then you'll need to tread carefully -- if you are still within the SOL for contract actions they can simply file the case again even if you get it vacated, only this time they know exactly where to find you because you had to tell teh court when you moved to vacate. Plus, you have to be careful with the SOL, because in a lot of states the SOL is "tolled" -- i.e., the time dosen't run -- while an action is going on. If you are going to pay anyway, I would contact the attorney from a phone not at your house or employment (or YOUR cell phone) and offer to pay in exchange for a stipulation vacating the judgment, and I would make it clear that I would NOT pay without such a stipulation. Very, very few attorneys are going to give one whit about the stipulation -- they don't want to ruin your credit, they just want the $$. Good luck.
Re: Judgment Not reporting Here's a little background: In November of 1997 I rented a small 1 bedroom apartment with my boyfriend at the time as co-signer. In June of 1998, the neighbor's cockroaches migrated to my apartment and several eggs hatched on my coffee table and my clean laundry. I called the landlord who stated that they would "bomb" like they did for all the other apartments that had a problem. Well, he bombed and a week later, they were back. SO I moved out and broke the lease. BTW, I had called them everyday for a week to tell them of the problem. After I moved out, I called the Landlord again to tell them that I wanted to walk through the apartment with them in a week. They said that they were not going to do a walk through until they had a professional company spray the building for roaches. WELL, I get this letter in the mail about 8 months later with a return address of my boyfriend's mother. Sure enough, there are papers in there. BUT there was a note inside the envelope from her that said when she came home from work, she found them tacked to her front door. Noone signed for them because noone was home. Then about 3 months after that, my now fiance, ran off to Florida with some blonde I caught him in bed with. So he doesn't even know that there is a judgement against him either. I don't even know how to get a hold of him to see if he went to court for it. The SOL for judgements in NY is 10 years at 8%. What does the 8% mean? and if I call this law firm to settle the judgement, will it be settled for my ex- as well? Was I properly served? Thanks.
Re: Judgment Not reporting Ok, from what you say here, it does not SOUND like you were properly served, but to be sure your REALLY need to see the Affidavit of Service filed in the case, which is in the court file. The court file will also indicate if your ex went to court on this. "8%" sounds like the statutory interest rate (I thought it was 9%, though). In any event, in NY, interest from the date of judgment is automatic at a set rate. If you were jointly liable, which it sounds like you were, then your settlement will be for him as well. You should make sure in the court file, though, that he didn't satisfy the judgment. It's possible that he did, but that the satisfaction was incorrectly filed as to him only. FYI, the statute in NY for service on a person is as follows: It sounds from your story that the were going for "2" or "4" -- that's why you need to see the Affidavit of Service. Which court was this in? If it was in Manhattan (New York County) Supreme Court or New York City Civil Court, I could go look at the court file for you. I work across the street.
Re: Judgment Not reporting Thanks for your reply, but it was in Monroe County, kind of west of where you are. At the time he was living with his mom, and therefore I assume that he was properly served. I lived there for about 2 months after moving out of the apartment and then moved back home. I did change my address with everyone and their grandmother so I find it hard to believe that they followed the "due diligence" of finding me when my address correction was on file everywhere. I think that they were just lazy and fixed both to the door to save time. I will go down to the clerk's office and look at what is on file there. Do I need to make copies of everything just for my records? I do want to satisfy this because someday it WILL pop up on me when I least expect it, but will a motion to vacate simply release me of the judgement or will I have to go back to court to defend myself? And if the motion to vacate does release me of the judgement and the SOL to collect on written contracts is up, can they legally file for another judgement? Thanks for your help!!! I really appreciate it!
Re: Judgment Not reporting I would definitely make copies of everything just so you know you have the complete file, unless it is REALLY easy for you to go back. If there is too much to make copies of, the key documents for you to get and copy are the complaint, the affidavit of service, the motion dor a default judgment, the actualy judgment, and any satisfaction of the judgment there may be. As I said before, it sounds to me like you have good grounds for amotion to vacate, and nothing you've said so far leands me to think otherwise. But it will all depend on the dates of everything -- when you lived there, what they say they did and when, etc., etc. A motion to vacate willnot simply release you from the debt. First yuou have to understand that a motion to vacate is not going to be granted automatically. You will have to servce it on the lawyer for the creditor and they will have an opportunity to oppose it, and if they oppose it the court will have to make a determination as to whetehr you were served correctly or not. If there is a factual dispute, the court may have a hearing -- called a "traverse" hearing -- to sort it all out. If the motion is granted then this case will most likely be dismissed, because their time to serve has long since expired. BUT the dismissal will be "without prejudice," which means that they can just re-file. The NY State SOL on contracts is six years, and you are well within it. You will have to file your address and phone number in court to move to vacate. So it would be a simple matter for them to re-file and then service you if they so chose. Given all of that, and that you do want to get this taken care of, I would do this (only AFTER making sure this wasn't already paid for by the ex-): Get a copy of the affidavit of service and the complaint so you can figure out (1) what your best argument for defective service is, and (2) what the original amount in suit, not counting extras like interest and attorneys' fees was. Then fax them a letter telling them that this judgment has recently come to your attention, and that servcie was improper because of XXXXXX. You intend to move to vacate the judgment, but, in the interests of putting it all behind you, you are willing to send payment of $X in exchange for a stipulation vacating the judgment and discontinuing the action. I'll bet that they'll jump at this. If for whatever reason you end up having to actually move to vacate, let me know -- I prepared and filed such motions for myself before, and I can send you copies of those so you have a guide.
Re: Judgment Not reporting Wayyy cool. I knew this site would prove useful! Strange thing is, I can't find any of my stuff in the VA court databases. Squawk, do you reckon the database just isn't completely online yet? They are from 1992 and 1995. I can pull up other cases from those years, but not mine. I searched by case number. Got a screen with case number and no details. Any thoughts? breeze
Re: Judgment Not reporting Breeze -- I would guess that with respect to old cases, the database is incomplete and probably will remain incomplete. Every jurisdiction (in most states, counties or parishes) used to keep their own records, and getting all of them loaded to a publiclly acessabile database is just a hit or miss proposition. As new cases are filed, though, they should be on there. Just a guess, though, based on how the system has evolved in NY.
Re: Judgment Not reporting That was my first thought, but if I enter the exact date I get records....just not mine. Searched by name, date, and record number - nothing. I am going to call the clerk of court and see if they can pull it up on their system. The last time I tried that, they didn't seem to be able to get it, but she was trying to get me off the phone, so I'm not sure how hard she tried. breeze
