Powerless and Out in the Cold.

We take so much for granted.

When the snow started coming down so heavy, so wet, we saw it coming. Tree limbs burdened with snow bring down power lines. The temperature plunges into single digits. The snow piles up so high that you can’t walk three feet past the door.

Without electricity, you can’t work. But more importantly, you can’t flee because you can’t move enough snow personally to clear your driveway to back your car to the unplowed street.

We’ve had longer power outages before, even in the beastly cold. But we’ve never had the combination of no power, deep cold and deep snow.

We were able to enlist help and get away. But what we found on the roads was just as grim. The City of Pittsburgh was crippled. Main roads untouched 24 hours after the snow began. Driving on four lane highways that felt like snowy open fields. Without four wheel drive, you’re going nowhere. Ice from compacted snow made for a crazy wild ride, like in an amusement park, violently lurching side to side. Roadblocks were everywhere, mostly consisting of stuck or abandoned vehicles.

How lucky we are to live in a technological world where most everything works like charm most of the time. Lets make the most of it.

CLT

Category: Uncategorized

Landlord-Tenant: Tenant is Entitled to At Least 90 Days Notice After Foreclosure.

Under the federal Protecting Tenants at Foreclosure Act, the new owner after foreclosure can no longer summarily evict residential tenants. If the owner intends to occupy the structure as a residence, he must give 90 days notice to vacate. However, if the owner does not intend to occupy the premises, the tenant must be given the opportunity to complete the term under the lease.

The Attorney General of Connecticut recently warned foreclosing banks not to ignor the rights of tenants under the statute.

CLT

Category: Uncategorized

Let Me Tell You Something Really Important About Getting Sued.

Some plaintiffs, like credit card issuers, win almost all of their cases by default.

When the Sheriff serves you, the clock starts running. In Pennsylvania, after 20 days following sheriff service the plaintiff sends you a notice in the mail saying that default judgment will be taken if a response is not filed in 10 more days.

So basically, you have a little more than 30 days (depending how quickly the letter is sent) to file something in writing. If you don’t do anything, you lose!

So, as soon as possible, talk to a lawyer. If you are not sure that this particular lawyer handles this particular kind of case, ask him or her to recommend the right lawyer to represent you.

But don’t give up without a fight. And don’t forget the time limits.

Here’s a story on point that a lawyer I know told me today. He filed preliminary objections (on time) to a complaint by a major credit card issuer against his client. It seemed like an open and shut case — after all, the defendant had used the card. But the complaint was not “verified” (signed) by a representative of the plaintiff, as required by the rules of civil procedure. Instead, the verification page was signed by the plaintiff’s lawyer, a practice that is commonplace, but usually not authorized by the rules. After oral argument on this single issue, the judge gave the plaintiff twenty days to obtain a proper verification.

Twenty days later, the plaintiff hadn’t filed the proper verification. Whereupon, my friend filed judgment in behalf of his client against the credit card issuer. Case over — but the tables were turned. Some business organizations, it seems, are simply not equipped to respond quickly, even when the requirements are quite simple.

Here’s something else you might not know about this kind of case. When the credit card issuer sells delinquent accounts in bulk to a third party, who then tries to collect them, the odds that the new plaintiff will be able to prove its case in court are greatly reduced. This is because card issuers usually give only fragmentary documentation to the assignee. But if you don’t respond to the complaint, you will never have the chance to make them try to prove the case against you.

CLT

PS. Even if a default judgment is filed, your lawyer might be able to open it if you both move very quickly. But that’s another story.

Category: Uncategorized

Are We Lost Yet?

Last night, ABC kicked of the final season of “Lost”. This show is based upon a fantasy we’ve all had: shipwrecked on a tropical island. But nobody’s imaginary tropical island was ever like this one.

Five years into this saga, separate time threads have diverged into parallel universes. The season premiere brings a critical change in the events in the 1970’s, causing the Oceanic Air crash that began the series to have never happened. The passengers disembark in Los Angeles and go on with their normal lives. Meanwhile, back in the 70’s, the adventure that began last season continues. Past and future collide when the living John Locke of the 70’s and the dead John Locke of the present meet.

Other contemporary fiction has explored the anomalies of time travel. Among them is Audrey Niffenberger’s riveting novel, “The Time Traveler’s Wife.” The book suggests a myriad of problems and contradictions that might arise, for both the traveler and those who wait in the present. It is a fascinating mental exercise.

Of course, we all have complete mastery of time and space in one sense. Each has the capacity to create an infinite number of alternate universes in the mind and as long as these worlds stay in the mind or in dramatic productions, we are safe. If man ever brings time travel to reality, it will be a very dangerous (but exciting) world.

In most time travel fiction, the traveler leaves and returns to the present, but in “Lost”, there are two parallel selves, one in the present universe and one in the past. And it seems, at least on “Lost”, they can meet each other. Would you sign up for time travel if it involved meeting your former self? Complicated, isn’t it?

Despite all of this, I suspect that many of us would volunteer to travel in time in an instant. The motivation would be more than adventure, it would be to change the the course of the river — making things that happened disappear and of course, the opposite.

Humorist Douglas Adams points out in “Restaurant at the End of the Universe” that once time travel catches on, the present time starts filling up with travelers from the past and future and the present world becomes irrational and unpredictable. For those who haven’t read the book, the “End of the Universe” is a time, not a place.

But so far, we haven’t been given these choices. So, we’ll just have to watch “Lost” and see what happens. If we preferred simple, we wouldn’t have stayed tuned in this long. We could be watching another Island — Gilligan’s.

CLT

Category: Uncategorized

Fifty Years Ago: Carolina Gentlemen Sit In.

On February 1, 1960 four black students “sat in” at a segregated lunch counter at Woolworth’s in Greensboro, NC. It was a historic event because it started a movement — one that only ended when its goal had been achieved. The International Civil Rights Center and Museum opened its doors today at the very building where the Woolworth’s lunch was located and where the Woolworth’s sign still hangs.

But like many great events, its significance was not immediately evident or widely noted. The New York Times did not report about it until about two weeks later.

The four students, from North Carolina A&T College, an all-black institution, were joined, on subsequent days by a growing number of others, including numerous white people. At least two, possibly more, of these pioneers were student at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Since they had been arrested and put in jail, they soon found themselves before the Men’s Honor Council at the University. UNC had a self-governing honor system, where students report other students who fail to live up to the ideals of a “Carolina Gentleman.” Arcane as it sounds today, the code of student conduct was, for men at least, built upon the ideal of “gentlemanly conduct.”

About eight years after this event, as a UNC student government politico, I happened to run across the written opinion of the student court in its archives. The court, composed of university undergraduates, acknowledged that under well-established precedent, disorderly conduct — the kind that got you arrested by the police — was not conduct becoming a gentleman.

However, there were other characteristics of “gentlemanly conduct” that must be considered. A gentleman is governed by moral principles. A gentleman has the courage of his convictions. A gentleman speaks out against injustice.

The court concluded that the lunch counter sit-in was a courageous, principled statement that was consistent with gentlemanly conduct.

Good show, Carolina Gentlemen!

CLT

Category: Uncategorized

Prepaid Legal Service’s Top 5 Request Categories.

A large prepaid legal service provider, Prepaid Legal Services, Inc., published its list of the top 5 categories of requests for its services last year. They are:

Real Estate, Landlord/Tenant Issues and Foreclosure – Approximately 358,000 requests for legal services that include residential and commercial real estate transactions, landlord and tenant issues and legal counsel related to foreclosure and short sales

Consumer Finance – Approximately 195,000 requests for legal services related to retail transactions for warranties, guarantees and other contracts

Family Law – Approximately 193,000 requests for legal services related to divorce, child support, child custody and child visitation

Collections – Approximately 162,000 requests for legal assistance to support members against other parties and to defend members from third-party debt collectors

Estate Planning – Approximately 160,000 requests for legal services for preparation of wills and other counsel related to final estates.

All of these areas, with the exception of family law, are currently covered by Pittsburgh Legal Back Talk.

Bankruptcy and criminal law are probably 6 and 7.

Category: Uncategorized

Waiting for WiFi

Yesterday I spent a couple of hours at the blood bank donation center. I had my iPhone and plenty of time, but the location had no wifi and I could not pull in a broadband signal.

Any place that requires people to wait for any period of time, including doctor’s offices and hospital waiting rooms, should be equipped with wifi. Hospitals have attempted to ban cell phones from their entire building on the claim that their signals interfere with life-saving equipment. That claim, however, appears to be dubious at best, since the doctors use their cell phones all over the hospital. Better to provide a good free signal in designated waiting rooms and let the media users gravitate there.

The blood bank, which relies entirely upon volunteer donors, is always trying to boost participations with raffles and other promotions. There are plenty of us who would gladly pay in blood for a couple of quiet hours every now and again when we could recline in peace and read blogs and tweets.

CLT

Category: Uncategorized

Courtroom Security, Terror Version

Courthouses and courtrooms are increasingly being built for security, but no courthouse in America fits the requirements of the 9/11 bomber trials. For one thing, courthouses have multiple courtrooms, multiple trials and other public offices on the premises. In cities, they are in the middle of high rise offices and bustling commercial districts. In small towns, they are at the center of main street, with shops and other business establishments (including lawyer’s offices) arrayed around them.

The fact is inescapable that the kind of security required for a high profile terror trial (or any terror trial) would continuously disrupt the lives of everyone who is required to enter and exit the security perimeter on a regular basis. But there is more than delay and annoyance involved. Security forces, set on a hair pin trigger to prevent acts of terror, may actually misjudge a situation and roughly apprehend or even shoot a non-terrorist. Such events occur from time to time in ordinary police activity, one was being discussed on Pittsburgh talk shows this past week.

In order to have the kind of security that a terror trial demands, people with other business of any kind must be totally excluded from the security perimeter.

Thus, the building to house a trial with the highest security would, of necessity, be a prison. So where is there a prison with both state of the art highest security and courtroom facilities?

Back to Guantanamo.

Whatever the political and symbolic drawbacks, it is safe.

Plan B: Alcatraz.

Plan C: Antarctica.

Plan D: The Moon.

CLT

Category: Uncategorized

PittsburghLegal on Twitter.

If you would like to be notified of new posts on this blog, together with a link, you can follow PittsburghLegal on Twitter. I’ll also re-tweet selected tweets by others that I find interesting.

Most legal blogs maintain sites on Twitter these days and it is very quick and convenient to flip through these blog updates to find posts you want to read.

CLT

Category: Uncategorized

Closing the Book.

J. D. Salinger, the author of that generational icon Catcher in the Rye, died this week at 91. The New York Times recounted the story of a man once regarded in certain quarters to be a great (perhaps the greatest) American writer who abruptly stopped writing and retired as a publicity-shunning recluse.

We read Catcher as a class assignment in high school, a bold choice in a Catholic school in the early sixties. I thereby discovered for myself that Holden Caufield was no threat to western civilization. Instead he was just a baffled kid with no direction, not unlike others I knew and didn’t particularly want for friends.

I remember discussing the assignment with my mother and suggesting if she actually wanted to to know what the book was about, she ought to read it. Shortly thereafter, she became involved in a discussion at a cocktail party where some of the condemnations were heated, only to discover that she was the only person in the room who had actually read the book.

CLT

Category: Uncategorized

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Welcome

CLIFF TUTTLE has been a Pennsylvania lawyer for over 45 years and (inter alia) is a real estate litigator and legal writer. The posts in this blog are intended to provide general information about legal topics of interest to lawyers and consumers with a Pittsburgh and Western Pennsylvania focus. However, this information does not constitute legal advice and there is no lawyer-client relationship created when you read this blog. You are encouraged to leave comments but be aware that posted comments can be read by others. If you wish to contact me in privacy, please use the Contact Form located immediately below this message. I will reply promptly and in strict confidence.

Pittsburgh Legal Back Talk

Legal topics of interest to lawyers and consumers with a Pittsburgh and Western Pennsylvania focus.

1410 Posts and Counting

Categories

Powerless and Out in the Cold.

Landlord-Tenant: Tenant is Entitled to At Least 90 Days Notice After Foreclosure.

Let Me Tell You Something Really Important About Getting Sued.

Are We Lost Yet?

Fifty Years Ago: Carolina Gentlemen Sit In.

Prepaid Legal Service’s Top 5 Request Categories.

Waiting for WiFi

Courtroom Security, Terror Version

PittsburghLegal on Twitter.

Closing the Book.

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