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Lawyer Sent Case Results to Wrong Email
My question involves a traffic ticket from the state of: North Carolina
Alright so I am 19, I got pulled over for the first time ever at 18 back in April, which also happened to be my first speeding ticket. 53 in a 35.
My dad said he'll handle everything and so he hired a lawyer to go to court on my behalf. Court date was June 13th. My lawyer goes to court. I asked my dad about the results of my court date June 14th, and he said he didn't hear anything back. Fine. I ask him again the next week, and the next week, and basically all of July. He keeps telling me he never heard anything back and to stop worrying about it. I just brushed it off and went along with my summer.
Today, August 24, I receive a letter in the mail from my lawyer dated to August 16th. She says she sent an email on June 18th regarding my case and attaches the email along with the letter. Apparently, I had to attend a traffic class and write a 3-page essay about what I learned and read it in front of a judge on August 2nd in order to have my ticket dismissed. But she made a typo in my dad's email, so we never received it. Since we missed that deadline, my lawyer now has to renegotiate and there is another court date on August 29th.
What do I do. I am so annoyed with my dad, and my lawyer too. My lawyer did not make an effort to reach out after not hearing back for a whole month (June 18th.....July 18th..?) She only emailed again on July 31st. Wouldn't one think she would make an effort to call if emails arent sending through? And my dad also did not make an effort to call my lawyer. I kept telling him to. But he is always extremely busy with work. IDK. If I handled things myself, I definitely would have given my lawyer a call way back in June because my ticket was always on my mind and being so young, I didn't know what to expect or how serious anything is.
Will the judge or DA give me another opportunity to take a class and write a paper? I genuinely had no idea of any email and neither did my dad. My lawyer sent the initial email to the wrong email. I do not know what to expect now.
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Re: Lawyer Sent Case Results to Wrong Email
You're asking us to guess what an unknown judge and unknown DA will do?
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Re: Lawyer Sent Case Results to Wrong Email
Your lawyer-you call. Now, call them on Monday and ask them what you should expect.
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Re: Lawyer Sent Case Results to Wrong Email
And while we're at it, you're a legal adult and you were the one who was speeding. When your dad didn't call the lawyer back, what was wrong with you picking up the phone yourself?
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Re: Lawyer Sent Case Results to Wrong Email
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cbg
And while we're at it, you're a legal adult and you were the one who was speeding. When your dad didn't call the lawyer back, what was wrong with you picking up the phone yourself?
I had a client come into the office a couple of weeks ago. She was 19 and was dealing with a problem with the IRS that absolutely required HER to make a phone call to the IRS. I offered to make the phone call from our office where I could help her deal with them. Her response? "I am only 19, I cannot do anything at all like that unless my mother is present". She had a serious situation going on that I won't go into, but what her mother told her to do would have just made it worse.
There are some helicopter/controlling parents out there who have brainwashed their young adult children into believing that they cannot do anything unless mommy or daddy is in charge of what happens.
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Re: Lawyer Sent Case Results to Wrong Email
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cbg
And while we're at it, you're a legal adult and you were the one who was speeding. When your dad didn't call the lawyer back, what was wrong with you picking up the phone yourself?
I just went along with my summer. I also got extremely busy. Idk how to handle tickets or anything dealing with the law so my dad said he’ll do everything, which was a big mistake. He’s also a busy person himself. I would tell him to call and he would just forget. I didn’t think to call the lawyer myself because my father kept telling me to stop worrying about it.
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cbg
You're asking us to guess what an unknown judge and unknown DA will do?
Uh I’m assuming people on this forum are experienced with the law and could give me some advice. I don’t know. I just joined today.
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Re: Lawyer Sent Case Results to Wrong Email
No one here has a crystal ball so we can't predict what the judge will do. Hopefully your attorney will be able to convince the judge that the miscommunications were her fault and you will have a new deadline to take the class and prepare the essay. You could also show up in court on the 29th with your attorney, along with the completed essay and the reservation for the class in hand, to show the judge that just because the adults you depended on to help you with this screwed up, you are doing everything in your power to fix it.
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Re: Lawyer Sent Case Results to Wrong Email
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bcr229
No one here has a crystal ball so we can't predict what the judge will do. Hopefully your attorney will be able to convince the judge that the miscommunications were her fault and you will have a new deadline to take the class and prepare the essay. You could also show up in court on the 29th with your attorney, along with the completed essay and the reservation for the class in hand, to show the judge that just because the adults you depended on to help you with this screwed up, you are doing everything in your power to fix it.
Thank you for the genuine response! I already emailed my lawyer to see what she thinks about everything. The next class date is this Monday, and I am considering going despite the fact I am going to be right out of my wisdom tooth surgery. We'll see how that goes. The classes are only once a month, and the September class isn't until 9/30, so I am willing to go even though I'll likely be exhausted and drugged up. I am regularly a super cautious driver and the speeding ticket was an isolated incident, so this is really frustrating for me and I would do anything to fix it.
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Re: Lawyer Sent Case Results to Wrong Email
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llworking
I had a client come into the office a couple of weeks ago. She was 19 and was dealing with a problem with the IRS that absolutely required HER to make a phone call to the IRS. I offered to make the phone call from our office where I could help her deal with them. Her response? "I am only 19, I cannot do anything at all like that unless my mother is present". She had a serious situation going on that I won't go into, but what her mother told her to do would have just made it worse.
There are some helicopter/controlling parents out there who have brainwashed their young adult children into believing that they cannot do anything unless mommy or daddy is in charge of what happens.
Then they'd better learn to either start thinking for themselves, or accept the fact that Mommy and Daddy are going to control every aspect of their life and they're going to have to live with the results. There are no other alternatives.
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Re: Lawyer Sent Case Results to Wrong Email
The only real issue is between you and your father. You relied on his word and he failed you.
Legally speaking it is your lawyer and your issue and you are an adult so you should have stepped up and called the lawyer yourself.
So now your best option is to consult your lawyer about the possibilities and probabilities. If he is a very persuasive or connected attorney you may get a do over. If the lawyer is not the judges favorite person you could find yourself the target of one pissed off judges wrath.
Bcr’s suggestion of completing everything you were required to do that you can do prior to your new hearing may convince a judge you didn’t simply blow off your obligations but didn’t complete your obligations due to the miscommunication.
Btw; it’s likely the lawyer is also a busy guy. He was hired to be a lawyer, not a babysitter. If he believed he sent the communication to the correct address he likely felt no need to hold your hand. He probably figured if you had questions you would have called. With no call, he let you do whatever you wanted to regarding your penalties.
Beyond this being a lesson to start acting like an adult, hope fully you have learned that ignoring a problem usually doesn’t work out well. You were right to be concerned as you were. You should have kept the pressure on dad to get the actual results of the hearing or done so yourself.
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jk
The only real issue is between you and your father. You relied on his word and he failed you.
Legally speaking it is your lawyer and your issue and you are an adult so you should have stepped up and called the lawyer yourself.
So now your best option is to consult your lawyer about the possibilities and probabilities. If he is a very persuasive or connected attorney you may get a do over. If the lawyer is not the judges favorite person you could find yourself the target of one pissed off judges wrath.
Bcr’s suggestion of completing everything you were required to do that you can do prior to your new hearing may convince a judge you didn’t simply blow off your obligations but didn’t complete your obligations due to the miscommunication.
Btw; it’s likely the lawyer is also a busy guy. He was hired to be a lawyer, not a babysitter. If he believed he sent the communication to the correct address he likely felt no need to hold your hand. He probably figured if you had questions you would have called. With no call, he let you do whatever you wanted to regarding your penalties.
Beyond this being a lesson to start acting like an adult, hope fully you have learned that ignoring a problem usually doesn’t work out well. You were right to be concerned as you were. You should have kept the pressure on dad to get the actual results of the hearing or done so yourself.
I am going to disagree a bit with this post. I do agree that the OP should have been more proactive, but the attorney would have gotten a message that the email was undeliverable and should have followed through by telephone or snail mail.
The attorney doesn't get a "pass" because they sent an email that wasn't delivered. They knew that the email wasn't delivered.
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Re: Lawyer Sent Case Results to Wrong Email
While I understand where you're coming from, I rarely get notices on my work email that an email I sent was not delivered unless I actively go looking for it. Those notices are automatically re-directed by a security system into a separate folder and do not get to my main Inbox ever.
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Re: Lawyer Sent Case Results to Wrong Email
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cbg
While I understand where you're coming from, I rarely get notices on my work email that an email I sent was not delivered unless I actively go looking for it. Those notices are automatically re-directed by a security system into a separate folder and do not get to my main Inbox ever.
I can see that on an email situation like a university's email system. Those system's are pretty huge. However an attorney's email system would likely not be that huge and would likely not WANT an email system that did not alert the attorney to an email that was not delivered.
An attorney actually has some fairly serious liability if they do not get communications to their clients. I remember a case where my boss got sued for something and used the corporate attorneys to hand the case. They messed up and didn't inform him of a court date and a default judgement was entered. The attorneys actually paid the judgement themselves because they messed up.
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jk
The only real issue is between you and your father. You relied on his word and he failed you.
Legally speaking it is your lawyer and your issue and you are an adult so you should have stepped up and called the lawyer yourself.
So now your best option is to consult your lawyer about the possibilities and probabilities. If he is a very persuasive or connected attorney you may get a do over. If the lawyer is not the judges favorite person you could find yourself the target of one pissed off judges wrath.
Bcr’s suggestion of completing everything you were required to do that you can do prior to your new hearing may convince a judge you didn’t simply blow off your obligations but didn’t complete your obligations due to the miscommunication.
Btw; it’s likely the lawyer is also a busy guy. He was hired to be a lawyer, not a babysitter. If he believed he sent the communication to the correct address he likely felt no need to hold your hand. He probably figured if you had questions you would have called. With no call, he let you do whatever you wanted to regarding your penalties.
Beyond this being a lesson to start acting like an adult, hope fully you have learned that ignoring a problem usually doesn’t work out well. You were right to be concerned as you were. You should have kept the pressure on dad to get the actual results of the hearing or done so yourself.
Thank you for this response. My lawyer's law firm is named after her, and I am assuming that is a good thing? I am not sure how common that is though or how many lawyers work under the law firm. I also do not know about her track record as I could not find any online reviews for her.
Also, I understand that she is probably a busy person, but it is confusing to me that she did not make any effort apart from 2 days before my August 2nd court date to figure out if I had attended the class and written the essay. She sent the initial email with the case results on June 18th, and then only sent another email (to the same wrong address) on July 31st that simply read "please let me know if you completed the class and essay." My second court date (that I had no idea about) was two days later on August 2nd. I would think that she would want to send an email asking that information at least a week prior to the court date, and then maybe calling if she did not get a response two days before. Also, I had to show up in person on August 2nd. I would think she would have wanted to make sure I was going to be there. IDK how law works exactly but if I was a lawyer who had to rely on my client to be in court on a specific day, I would want to verify he or she is coming. I regret not reaching out myself. If I had known about the class and essay, I would have done that in a heartbeat. I did definitely learn a lot through this, most importantly to stop relying on my father (who does not want me to grow up) for important things like this.
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Re: Lawyer Sent Case Results to Wrong Email
If she is the senior partner of a law firm, being asked to take responsibility for a minor traffic offense, I can quite understand that she might have had other things on her mind than this one.
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Re: Lawyer Sent Case Results to Wrong Email
Your attorney isn't responsible for your completing the sentence, they ONLY represent you court. That you didn't immediately reach out after the trial is your fault, not hers. The attorney is not sanctioned for your behavior, they aren't a parent. As an adult you are the responsible party for completing your sentence, for contacting the attorney and for not acting in the way that required you to hire an attorney in the first place.
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Re: Lawyer Sent Case Results to Wrong Email
Why don't we rename this forum the Whipping Post. People can come here for advice and get flogged by members like Mark for asking for that advice.
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Re: Lawyer Sent Case Results to Wrong Email
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budwad
Why don't we rename this forum the Whipping Post. People can come here for advice and get flogged by members like Mark for asking for that advice.
And you're known for your kind and compassionate responses to folks, Bud.
There was no flogging. There was no digging at the OP, just a simple statement that the OP is responsible for their life and where the responsibilities begin and end for the attorney.
So...suck it, Bud. You don't like what I have to say then that's your problem. You made it a habit, of late, to have a go at the Sr members here and, while I don't know what's behind that, I'm not going to play beyond this one statement.
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Re: Lawyer Sent Case Results to Wrong Email
Sarrabee, yuo should know hardly anyone here is a lawyer. While many have experience with traffic offenses, about as many are knuckleheads. Even more are self-righteous jackasses who like to preach to people and "teach" them so-called moral responsibility. For whatever reason, they they get their kicks from that. I won't name any names, but you'll be able to recognize those by yourself.
Bcr229 has given you good advice. Go with that. Good luck.
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zeljo
Sarrabee, yuo should know hardly anyone here is a lawyer.
I have no problem with you writing that, but you should follow it with "and neither am I."
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llworking
I am going to disagree a bit with this post. I do agree that the OP should have been more proactive, but the attorney would have gotten a message that the email was undeliverable and should have followed through by telephone or snail mail.
The attorney doesn't get a "pass" because they sent an email that wasn't delivered. They knew that the email wasn't delivered.
That's assuming it WAS undeliverable. Just because there was a typo doesn't mean it didn't go to a legitimate email address.
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Re: Lawyer Sent Case Results to Wrong Email
Actually, that's a really good point. I am constantly getting emails for a woman in Ireland whose email is one letter off from mine.
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Re: Lawyer Sent Case Results to Wrong Email
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llworking
I am going to disagree a bit with this post. I do agree that the OP should have been more proactive, but the attorney would have gotten a message that the email was undeliverable and should have followed through by telephone or snail mail.
The attorney doesn't get a "pass" because they sent an email that wasn't delivered. They knew that the email wasn't delivered.
The attorney would have not gotten a message if it WAS a legitimate email address, even if it was not OP's Dad.
I have an email address that regularly gets email intended for others all over the world, including bank statements, party invitations, cell phone bills, and private conversation. All it takes is for a correspondent to not use a letter or number or two, and I've got mail.
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Re: Lawyer Sent Case Results to Wrong Email
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llworking
I am going to disagree a bit with this post. I do agree that the OP should have been more proactive, but the attorney would have gotten a message that the email was undeliverable and should have followed through by telephone or snail mail.
The attorney doesn't get a "pass" because they sent an email that wasn't delivered. They knew that the email wasn't delivered.
why do you think the attorney would be notified the email was undeliverable? Maybe it was delivered...to somebody. You’re jumping to conclusions that are not able to be known.
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sarrabee
Thank you for this response. My lawyer's law firm is named after her, and I am assuming that is a good thing? I am not sure how common that is though or how many lawyers work under the law firm. I also do not know about her track record as I could not find any online reviews for her.
Also, I understand that she is probably a busy person, but it is confusing to me that she did not make any effort apart from 2 days before my August 2nd court date to figure out if I had attended the class and written the essay. She sent the initial email with the case results on June 18th, and then only sent another email (to the same wrong address) on July 31st that simply read "please let me know if you completed the class and essay." My second court date (that I had no idea about) was two days later on August 2nd. I would think that she would want to send an email asking that information at least a week prior to the court date, and then maybe calling if she did not get a response two days before. Also, I had to show up in person on August 2nd. I would think she would have wanted to make sure I was going to be there. IDK how law works exactly but if I was a lawyer who had to rely on my client to be in court on a specific day, I would want to verify he or she is coming. I regret not reaching out myself. If I had known about the class and essay, I would have done that in a heartbeat. I did definitely learn a lot through this, most importantly to stop relying on my father (who does not want me to grow up) for important things like this.
she was hired to be a lawyer, not a parent. She sent an email (presumably per your father’s stated preferred means of communication and received no response. So, she may have figured you were doing what you were supposed to be doing she did not know anything different until she received notice of your failure to complete your penalty requirements. Upon receiving that notice it appears she did make contact in a means that is legally dependable.
It isnt your attorneys job to chase after you to make sure you are doing what you’re supposed to be doing. That is your job and since the last email said “ please let me know if you completed the [obligations], well, as far as she was concerned if you didn’t follow up, well, she isn’t your mother. You are the one that would suffer the consequences for failing to do the work.
The biggest issue, still, is your fathers involvement and his failure to follow up when it appeared the attorney wasn’t contacting you. Again, that was actually your responsibility since you were the client but I get the dad thing but all that does is mean this is his failure. I don’t see the attorney at fault here.
For future reference;
an attorney is not your parent and isn’t going to chase you down to make sure you did your homework. They will treat you like an adult and let you do the right thing or screw up; its your option. If you believe there is something wrong, it is your obligation to check into it and not expect anybody else to. In this situation, you appear to have realized something was amiss but you depended on your father to take care of things. That didn’t work out the best for you.