My Bank Account Has Been Frozen Because of a Judgement Made in Another State

[troutie]

Friday it was made aware to me that sometime over the past 2 weeks my bank account has been frozen. Fortunatly I'm a full time student so the account doesn't get used much but this is rather anoying since I use it every so often to pay bills online such as auto insurance which is coming up soon.

I contacted the bank and they gave me the number of a law firm that's in another state and that's apparently where the law suit was. I didn't think they could even do that.

I'm not even really sure what I'm supposed to do at this point.
The only assets I have are a car that doesn't run and a truck that barely runs. I'm not sure if should consider bankruptcy, I have student stafford loans that are deferred that I definatly intend to pay off when the time comes so I do not want to default on those.

What should I do? What can I do?
When I call the law firm they don't talk to me, if I say anything other than I'm calling to pay they put me on hold, act confused, make fun of me, refuse to give me any information about them, or hang up on me. Should I contact a court or agency here in Connecticut or where they are in New York? Will I have to higher a lawyer?

Any advice or direction would be much appreciated.

[aaron]

They got a judgment in another state. Were you served with a lawsuit from the other state, or was there an attempt to serve you which you ignored? Were you served with a judgment resulting from that lawsuit? Do you know the subject matter of the judgment (why you were sued) or the amounts involved?

Were you served with papers, or similarly did you ignore an attempt to serve you with papers, with regard to the registration of the judgment in the state where you presently live? Did you ignore that notice?

[troutie]

I haven't received any letters or notices.

I do know what it's about and about how much, ~$2,600. Not exactly an amount I can pay any time soon.

[aaron]

They would have had to represent to courts in both states that you were served, or have obtained permission for substituted service on the basis that you cannot be found. Obviously, though, you were found - or they wouldn't have been able to track you down in the new state. So consider contacting the courts which issued the orders to find out what happened.

[troutie]

How do I find out which court issued the order?

[GreatGadsby]

contact the law firm.

[aaron]

An order was served on your bank. They may tell you, or even provide a copy of the order.

[troutie]

contact the law firm.

they told me "Westchester Civil Court" and refused to give my any other information on it.

I can't find a phone # on google. Is there another name I should try searching for?

Thank you for your help.

[aaron]

Westchester County, New York? Try this.

[troutie]

Westchester County, New York? Try this.

Thank you.

I left a message for someone at my bank to get a copy of the order.
And I got the index number from the county clerk's website.

But now how do I dispute this? How do I make sure they did things the right way because I was never notified and I don't think they did things legally.

The law firm's name is Cohen & Slamowitz, searching on google I see there was a class action lawsuit against them for various things including procuring default judgements via improper service and illegal freezing of assets as well as out of date debts. This is from a credit card that I defaulted on in 1999.

Also where could I search to find out more about the class action lawsuit? Through google I only found posts on message boards but not much else on it.