Legal Survival Kit.pdf

Beat Lawyers At Their Own Game

Deaver Brown, Author

Brown co-founded the Umbroller stroller company, American Power

(APCC), and Simply Media. He published The Entrepreneurs Guide

with Macmillan in hardcover and Ballantine in mass market paperback.

He published a business series of CD-ROM’s with Macmillan and

another series with Simply Media. Brown graduated from Harvard

College and Harvard Business School. He has published numerous

articles in trade journals and business magazines.

Simply Media, Inc.

Lincoln, MA 01773-0481

www.simplymedia.com

About the SURVIVAL KIT Series

Our Survival Kits are designed to be quick, concise, and much

easier to read than most reference books. As in true wilderness

survival kits, the key to success is limiting your materials to the

least amount of weight necessary. This provides users with fast,

light, yet complete packs, and ensures easy travel without excess

baggage.

At Simply Media our hardest task is eliminating materials that

are not absolutely necessary for traversing the subject’s territory.

We take the time to make each of our Survival Kits as short and

concise as possible so you can learn the most important facts

with a fast cover-to-cover read.

About the LEGAL SURVIVAL KIT

The Legal Survival Kit pares down the huge amount of legal

information available, and provides you with the essentials for

your legal protection and planning.

In the spirit of “less is more,” the contents are concise and divid-

ed into small individual categories for faster reading and better

comprehension.

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Legal Survival Kit

BACKGROUND

How We Got to Where We Are

These two rules have led to an explosion in

American litigation. Well-financed lawyers can

fund clients to prosecute. If the funded client

loses, there is no financial consequence for the

plaintiff in all but the rarest of cases.

Is it any wonder, then, with these rules, that

we have so much litigation in the US and other

industrial countries so little? Other countries

have these guys under control.

American lawyers used to belong to an elite

club that “did the right thing,” or so we

thought. There have always been bad lawyers,

ambulance chasers, and the like. Even

Shakespeare said, “First, kill all the lawyers.”

These are the facts of life in the American

legal world. The American Trial Lawyers

Association is alive, well, and vigorously pro-

tects its privileges. It is the largest political

PAC, with all the implications of that powerful

position, protecting the interests of litigators

and defenders. Remember that for every liti-

gator there must be at least one legal defend-

er, usually another lawyer.

Your Role in the Legal World:

Winner or Loser

Of the major industrial countries, only the

United States permits:

In the current legal environment, you will

either be the winner or loser in your legal

affairs. As with most of us, you will sometimes

win and other times lose. The objective of this

CD-ROM is to keep you out of litigation and

help improve the odds you will win if you

become engaged in what has become a wide-

spread American activity.

(1) Contingency law suits. That is, the

plaintiffs do not have to bear any costs other

than a potential percentage award to the

lawyer.

(2) The loser does not have to pay the legal

costs of the winner.

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Legal Survival Kit

You cannot opt out since anyone can sue you

for anything, and these days, they often do. At

work or at play, at home or on the road, you are

always vulnerable to legal attack. Our efforts

are devoted to provide you the best advice and

tools to avoid litigation and prevail if it should

occur.

dren’s information, and so on and so on.

2. Set up a word document file where you save

this information plus each form you create for

later reference. If you wish to also keep this

record elsewhere, do so too (duplication will

only help you). You should also keep a hard

copy file of signed documents and your key

fact documents.

Insurance: Umbrella Liability

Coverage to protect you from

the lawyers on the prowl

3. If you do not have a fire proof safe, get one

and put these documents into them. The

office supply stores (e.g., Staples, Office Max,

and Office Depot, and their on line affiliates)

have them and will usually deliver at no

charge, so you don’t break your back carrying

your safe home. They cost about $150 each.

You can get them cemented into your base-

ment or into your floor for extra protection.

Do this too, if you can.

You should consider adding an umbrella liabili-

ty policy to your homeowner’s policy immedi-

ately to protect you from unforeseen lawsuits.

An annual additional liability policy of up to $1

million often costs no more than $100 per year.

This not only protects you from additional

losses should they occur, it also usually pro-

vides for the insurance company to cover and

manage all legal costs and activities—so you

can get on with your life in relative peace and

quiet. Do it!

4. Review these forms and consider doing well

care for yourself legally in advance of any

prospective problems. This means doing

proactive things you may not need immediate-

ly (important but not urgent, a category we all

tend to ignore at our peril), such as wills, pow-

ers of attorney, trusts, medical instructions,

and the like. If you don’t do them immediate-

ly, write out a schedule in which you will do

them—and then do them.

This Guide With Step-by-Step

Advice Per Form

We have provided you with this Guide in addi-

tion to step-by-step advice for each legal form.

After each document, we have provided specif-

ic advice for that form or letter in a “review

list”. This way, that advice is specific to the

form and not over generalized here.

Notwithstanding that, the following is general-

ly useful when filling out the forms and letters.

5. Encourage other members of your immedi-

ate and extended family to do the same kinds

of things. You will give them a great gift by

doing so.

1. Prepare and keep a separate document with

the key facts pertaining to each individual

and/or corporation and/or other entity you

enter into these documents. For individuals,

this should include their legal name, address,

social security number, passport number, other

pertinent numbers (such as Medicare or

Health Plan number), date of birth, date of

marriage, date of divorce if applicable, chil-

Action items:

1. Get additional umbrella liability

insurance policy coverage.

2. Get a home safe.

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Legal Survival Kit

INTRODUCTION

“You Have To Know The Law Well

To Make It Work For You.”

boldly than nonlawyers because they have

been trained in the law, have experience and

feedback from their prior activities, and there-

fore have a better sense of how to use these

tools (i.e. the forms) to expedite and formu-

late agreements for themselves and their

clients.

Clarence Darrow, the great trial lawyer, said

this long ago. Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes

admonished a participant in a particularly ugly

case, “Do not make the mistake of confusing

justice with the law.” Finally, one can com-

plete that thought with Winston Churchill’s

repeated comment, said in various contexts,

that democracy, and the rule of law, although

messy, is the fairest system people have yet

invented.

If you are not a lawyer, you should restrict

yourself to the simpler forms or fill out a form

you need and then request a lawyer to review

it on your behalf. Your very act of selecting and

completing certain documentation in advance

of turning the matter over to an attorney will

save them time and therefore save you money.

Audio One: Introduction

Our primary objective in this Guide, with illus-

trative audios, is to provide you with a broad

background of the legal system and suggest

the appropriate tools to use when dealing with

the legal system in general and lawyers in par-

ticular. Our 600-form section is used by many

practicing lawyers who, like you, can benefit

from prepackaged forms that can be edited

upon demand. Lawyers can do this more

Tip: If you ever feel “concerned,”

“worried,” or “uncertain” about any-

thing discussed or presented in a legal

form, that is your tip-off to contact a

lawyer for clarification and implementation.

Self-help forms should never be used unless

you are entirely confident of your actions. We

do not offer legal advice. We offer personal and

business advice about how to interface with

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Legal Survival Kit

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