Bankruptcy attorneys work to understand and represent you to the court. A good lawyer will always look at your entire financial situation and suggest filing for bankruptcy only after all other options have been exhausted. You should be very cautious of any lawyer who suggests filing without first looking at the facts and figures. Remember, this decision will affect your credit for 10 years until it ages off your credit report. Combined with the cost and potential loss of property it is something that takes an experienced lawyer who understands that each case is different and will offer counseling to the client instead of rushing to court.

An unexpected illness is the number one reason that most people go bankrupt. It doesn’t take much, especially if you lack insurance, to drain your bank account and send your finances into disarray. You should never look at having to file for protection from creditors as a reflection of you. All one has to do is look at large companies such as Enron to see that companies use and abuse the system for their benefit – therefore you should not feel ashamed to use it for a legitimate reason.

Finding a Bankruptcy Attorney in New Hampshire is a post from: Reference Education Center

1. Check with Friends, Family People you know can be an excellent resource to help you locate a family law attorney. Somebody you know probably has been through a similar experience; their advice and support can be useful to you.

2. The Bar Association A local or state bar association can be a wonderful resource as they will tell you which of their members specialize in Family Law. Get a hold of that list, contact the attorneys directly, and interview them. Typically, your first visit is free so that you can learn what the family law attorney will do for you, their fee structure, and much more.

3. Legal Aid Societies Your state or county should have a legal aid society. If you find that the cost of retaining counsel is prohibitive, consider contacting your local chapter for help. Some will offer their services for free or pro bono. Some attorneys will charge you based on a sliding scale, taking into consideration your ability to repay. For parents with limited means, this can be a terrific option.

4. Research Your library has legal directories featuring all kinds of legal professionals, while the internet is an excellent resource for accurate and up to date information. Forums, list servs, ads, and articles like the one you are reading now can be good sources to help you find attorney related information.

5. Check the Phone Book One of the most popular places for attorneys to list their availability is with an old stand by: your phone book. Right smack dab in the yellow pages you will find scores of attorneys featured with all the of their contact information listed, including web sites.

Divorce certainly isnt fun, in fact it is downright painful. Your children will suffer, but you can help ease the transition for them and you by finding an attorney who is compassionate and caring. For additional support and spiritual guidance, arrange a visit with your pastor today.

Find a Good Family Law Attorney is a post from: Reference Education Center

By far men are convicted of more crimes than women. Women account for just 6.7% of the entire federal prison population. They do make up 27.6% of the federal prison staff. The most common race of federal inmates is Black, followed by Hispanic (classified as white) and white non-Hispanic. Native Americans account for 1.8% of the population and Asians round out the list at 1.6%. There are currently 31,891 Mexican citizens serving time in the federal prison system.

The majority of inmates are locked up in low and medium security prisons. Only 10.3% of the federal inmate population is serving time in high security prisons. 18.7% are serving time in minimum-security locations. While the news routinely talks about how the government is soft on immigration, the stats provided by the Federal Bureau of Prisons show that at least some enforcement is happening. There are 18,886 (10.8%) inmates in the federal system doing time for immigration related offenses.

A strong majority of inmates are serving time for drug related offenses. Weapons, Explosives and Arson offenses are a distant second. Just over half of the entire federal inmate population is being incarcerated for drug related offenses. Most of those incarcerated are serving between 5 and 15 years. Only 3.1% of the population has a life sentence and a miniscule 38 have death sentences. 5-10 years is the most common sentence. Close to 30% of the inmates are serving a sentence of this length.

There are 3,657 sex offenders serving time in federal prisons. Countless others get out and renege on their obligations of release. Only 72.8% of those held in federal prisons are American citizens. Given all of this information, the average federal prison inmate is a minority male in his 30s serving 5-15 years for a drug related offense.

Federal Prison Report is a post from: Reference Education Center

Controlling Software

The Federal Communications Commission has issued a policy paper that sets free speech back a few thousand years. Yep, the FCC is taking the position that computer software companies must first get approval from the FBI before they will be allowed to put software products on the market. Think about that for a minute and cringe.

The ostensible reason for Big Brothers power grab is, once again, the pursuit of terrorist and bad, bad people. You see, Brother wants to make every software company put a backdoor in their systems that lets Big Brother access your computer on the sly to keep an eye on you. No doubt, many evil people use Adobe and Microsoft products!

Big Brother Out of Control?

Obviously, everyone is interested in catching terrorists and bad guys. The idea of giving the FBI carte blanche power over the software industry, however, goes way beyond such concerns. Let us consider a practical example.

What if construction companies had to seek approval from the FBI before building homes? The ostensible reason would be to make sure the FBI could place cameras and wire taps in every home to monitor and stop terrorist activities. Surely, nobody could disagree with such a noteworthy goal. On the other hand, how would you feel about having cameras in each room of your home?

For a counter argument, government apologists claim that the FBI would watch the computer activity of only a small number of people because the FBI doesnt have the manpower to do anything else. This argument is so much nonsense. Watching computer activity doesnt require manpower. It is a technical function carried out by a software program. The FBI already has such programs, including the controversial green lantern program. If it didnt, why would it want this power?

FBI monitoring programs run automatically. They continually accumulate data, which can be accessed when needed. This data collection can be used in thousands of different ways by hundreds of different agencies. For instance, what if the IRS audits you? What is to stop it from accessing your computer data and looking at all of the sessions you performed online banking? Nothing. The IRS and FBI work hand-in-hand on numerous prosecutions.

The United States is supposed to be the land of the free. Just dont assume as much when using your computer.

FBI and FCC Seek Control of Software Industry is a post from: Reference Education Center

Expungement of Criminal Records An Overview

To expunge criminal records is to involve a trade-off between competing interests. An individual would like to pursue employment, housing, or other major life activities without the stigma of an arrest record or a record of conviction. On the other hand, society has an interest in maintaining criminal records histories for purposes of future crime investigations and in order to make hiring, rental, and other decisions about individuals. Statutes and cases reflect the tension between these interests.

There are ways for you to expunge your criminal records. In reality, by statute and by inherent judicial authority, criminal records may be expunged.

What is Expungement of Criminal Records?

Expungement of criminal records can mean to seal or destroy these records, or return it to the subjects of the records. The exact remedy in a given situation depends on statutory provisions or the courts interpretation of its inherent power.

How Criminal Records are Expunged

Although states generally differ in how they expunge records, by most statutes, arrest records held by law enforcement must be returned to an arrested individual if proceedings are determined in the individuals favor before specified stages of the criminal justice process. This means that the individual has the right to have his criminal records of arrest expunged if no further evidence is found incriminating his involvement in the crime in question and if no other criminal justice action is pursued.

Also by statute, criminal records held by any criminal justice agency will be expunged or sealed by court order but not returned or destroyed. This action is often done if an individual was convicted in a kind of case covered by the specific state statute or had proceedings resolved in specified ways that fall short of conviction. Therefore, any criminal records of court filings created in a case where no conviction was made or in a case where the crime in question falls under the category specified under the statute may be expunged or sealed by the presiding court.

Finally, the courts have held that they have the power to require the sealing or expungement of judicial branch criminal records. Also, to a more limited degree, they may exercise this power of expungement on criminal records held by other branches of state government.

Expunge Criminal Records An Expert Guide is a post from: Reference Education Center

There is an old saying, “nothing is sure in life except death and taxes”. Whether you like it or not, someday you will die. How you die and how it effects the people you leave behind can be affected by whether or not you have a living will.

Say you feel that if you develop an inevitably fatal illness, you do not want any extreme measures taken to prolong your suffering or to cause you additional suffering or loss of dignity while you are dying. Say you have a massive stroke and end up in a coma and according to the doctors you are brain dead or completely unresponsive. You are being kept alive by a bunch of machines and tubes. Now say you had previously told someone, your spouse, one of your children or a parent, that you did not want to be kept alive by extreme measures. That person tells the doctor that you would not want to be kept alive by a machine, however, another family member, who can not take the thought of your dying, tells the doctor that you wanted to be kept alive by any means possible. Now, there is a problem. Remember the seven (7) year court battle over Terri Schiavo.

Both family members love you and both want to do what is best, however they disagree and end up causing great emotional distress to each other and to other people who love you, as well as forcing you to be kept ailve against your wishes while the matter is being settled, and as well as running up considerable medical and legal expenses that have to be paid by someone. None of this would have taken place had you taked the time to have a living will prepared.

Conversely, say that you would like to receive all medical treatment that is available, no matter what. Since you can not speak for yourself, your spouse or a loved one, not knowing your wishes and who believes in dying with dignity, tells the doctor to turn off the machines and let you die. No one else knows what you wanted so the machines are turned off and you die. Had you taken the time to have a living will prepared they would have tried to keep you alive.

The foregoing examples are very black and white and most incidences will vary in various shades of grey, however I hope that you will understand the point that I am trying to get across.

Note: I am not an attorney or a doctor and none of the foregoing should be construed as legal or medical advice. This article is written strictly as my opinion based on life experiences through both my personal life and my work as a private investigator when investigating family disputes. As in all matters of law you should always consult an attorney before taking on any legal endeavor.

Whether you are married, single, young, old, healthy or ill, a living will is an inexpensive way of insuring that your wishes are carried out in the event that something untoward happens. It could also spare your loved ones the emotional distress of being forced to make such an important decision for you.

Everyone Should Have A Living Will is a post from: Reference Education Center

In Scott & Co v Richardson [2005], the Dependant, Mr Richardson, who worked for a Scottish firm of debt collectors, refused to accept his new terms of employment which required him to visit defaulting debtors during the evenings. Mr Richardson agreed to work evenings but only if this would continue to attract overtime payments as had previously been the case. Scott & Co tried for seven months to persuade Mr Richardson to change his mind but he refused, finally issuing an ultimatum that his employer should either accept his position or dismiss him. They chose to dismiss him.

At first instance, Scott & Co claimed that the change in working conditions was required to bring the company into line with new market practices and to allow them to plan work more cheaply and effectively. Mr Richardson argued that Scott & Co had failed to prove that there were advantages to the new working arrangements and that the real reason for the changes was to save money in overtime payments.

Mr Richardson succeeded in his claim for unfair dismissal and the Employment Tribunal held that it did not appear that the imposition of the shift system was of such discernible advantage that the only reasonable thing to do was to terminate the employee’s contract unless he would agree to the new arrangement.

On appeal the EAT overturned this decision and held that:-

A Tribunal should not ‘second guess’ an employer’s business decision;
A Tribunal should evaluate whether dismissal was due to the employer’s reasonable belief that the contract changes had advantages; and
The employer did not need to prove that those advantages objectively exist.
This is good news for employers who can rely on the principle that the tribunal must respect their commercial decisions in assessing whether a fair reason for dismissal has been shown. However this must be tempered by another EAT decision in Forshaw and others v Archcraft Limited [2005], where the EAT relied on its own assessment that the clause in question was unreasonable and found that the dismissal was unfair. In Forshaw the EAT said that while the tribunal generally will not re-open the commercial decisions of an employer’s management, however, a reason which is genuinely held but is trivial or unworthy or whimsical will mean that the dismissal is unfair.

Comment: Provided that care is taken, changes to employment terms which are supported by sound commercial reasons will be acceptable under the law.
If you require further information contact us.

Email: enquiries@rtcoopers.com

RT COOPERS, 2005. This Briefing Note does not provide a comprehensive or complete statement of the law relating to the issues discussed nor does it constitute legal advice. It is intended only to highlight general issues. Specialist legal advice should always be sought in relation to particular circumstances.

Employment Law: Unfair Dismissal – Employer Succeeded in Changing Terms of Employment is a post from: Reference Education Center

The employee was a manager of a national chain of pubs and restaurants. He brought a complaint of unfair constructive dismissal against his employer in the employment tribunal on the grounds of failure to support him throughout a period of a year during his career. He alleged that:

he had been harassed by the senior managers regarding changes to his and his wife’s single contracts to a lower-paid joint contract;
he had been bullied and his grievance initially ignored;
his grievance had been partially upheld but the bullying had continued;
the employer’s conduct amounted to a fundamental breach of his contract of employment – the implied term of mutual trust and confidence (the cause of his resignation);
his dismissal had been unfair in all the circumstances.
The tribunal found that, in view of the cumulative effect of the course of conduct by the employer, there had been a fundamental breach of the implied term of mutual trust and confidence in the employee’s contract of employment, and it was that breach that had been the effective cause of the employee’s resignation. The employee’s claim of unfair constructive dismissal was upheld. The employer appealed to the Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) against that decision. The employer’s appeal was dismissed.

The EAT found that:-

the test for constructive dismissal was whether the employer’s conduct amounted to a repudiatory breach of the employee’s contract of employment in relation to the implied term of mutual trust and confidence;
a relatively minor act might be sufficient to entitle the employee to resign if it was the last straw in a series of incidents;
in this case, nothing had been done to stop the chain of causation;
the employee had continually complained about the lack of support, and the tribunal could not be criticised as a result of its conclusions.
If you require further information contact us.

Email: enquiries@rtcoopers.com

RT COOPERS, 2005. This Briefing Note does not provide a comprehensive or complete statement of the law relating to the issues discussed nor does it constitute legal advice. It is intended only to highlight general issues. Specialist legal advice should always be sought in relation to particular circumstances.

Employment Law: Unfair Dismissal – Constructive Dismissal – ‘Last Straw’ is a post from: Reference Education Center

The employee was originally employed by the BBC as an architect in its construction management department. On or around 12 November 2001, a substantial part of the construction department was transferred to the appellant employer, Thornley, under the Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations 1982.

Following this transfer, the employer announced its plans to restructure the department. This meant that the employee’s role would have changed to that of a managerial role from the hands-on architectural work she had previously done. On or around 1 October 2002, the employee attended a meeting where she indicated that she believed her position was being made redundant. She wrote to the employer stating that as a result of the proposed restructuring, her professional expertise was being dissipated and she was becoming de-skilled as an architect. She also stated that her position was being made redundant. On or around 8 December, she again wrote to her employer raising a grievance in respect of the new role, which she claimed was not comparable with the job specification of the role she had when she was transferred to the employer.

She brought a grievance hearing and following this hearing on 28 January 2003, the employee was informed that her position was not redundant. On 13 February, she resigned on the grounds of constructive dismissal. The employee then made an employment tribunal claim where she claimed constructive dismissal. The tribunal found that the effective cause of the employee’s resignation had been the imposition of the new job description, which fundamentally breached the terms of her contract, with the result that the employee was entitled to resign and to be treated as having been dismissed. The tribunal therefore upheld her claim. The employer appealed to the Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT).

The employer in its appeal contended that the tribunal had misconstrued the employee’s contract of employment:
The tribunal’s decision was perverse;
The issues for the determination by the EAT were whether the tribunal had erred in arriving at its conclusion with regard to:
the extent of the employee’s duties under her contract;
the extent to which those duties were to be changed;
whether the employer had been entitled to change her duties; and
if not, whether the employer’s breach of contract was a fundamental breach entitling her to resign.
The EAT dismissed the appeal and held that in the circumstances:

the tribunal was entitled to conclude that the changes to the employee’s duties under her contract of employment were a fundamental breach of her contract;
the tribunal did not err in its construction of the employee’s contract or in concluding that by the changes proposed to her duties, the employer had intended not to be bound by her contract;
the tribunal’s decision that the employee was entitled to resign on the basis of constructive dismissal was correct;
no error could be detected in the way in which the tribunal identified the employee’s express duties under her contract of employment;
the tribunal’s conclusions on the evidence that there were significant changes to her duties, which would have had the effect of deskilling her as an architect, were unimpeachable; and
the employee’s contract, read as a whole, did not permit the employer to change the employee’s duties to the extent and nature it had proposed.
If you require further information contact us.

Email: enquiries@rtcoopers.com

RT COOPERS, 2005. This Briefing Note does not provide a comprehensive or complete statement of the law relating to the issues discussed nor does it constitute legal advice. It is intended only to highlight general issues. Specialist legal advice should always be sought in relation to particular circumstances.

Employment Law – Unfair Dismissal – Constructive Dismissal is a post from: Reference Education Center

The Employment Rights Act 1996 provides that an employment tribunal shall not consider a complaint for unfair dismissal unless it is presented to the tribunal within three months of the effective date of termination of employment.

However this three-month limitation period may be extended if the tribunal considers that in the relevant case, it was not reasonably practicable for the complaint to be presented within the three months.

There are similar provisions under the Disability Discrimination Act 1995.

The tribunal decided that:-

The complaint of unfair dismissal had not been presented within the three-month time limit, pursuant to s 111 of the Employment Rights Act 1996;
The complaint of disability discrimination had not been presented within the three-month time limit, pursuant to the para 3 Schedule 3 of the Disability Discrimination Act 1995; and
Accordingly, the tribunal did not have jurisdiction to hear the claims.
The employee appealed to the Employment Appeal Tribunal (“EAT”) against the decision. The EAT held that:-

Decisions on whether or not a claim would be admitted out of time, for unfair dismissal or disability discrimination, were essentially questions of facts on which the tribunal should decide based upon the evidence submitted by the parties;
The onus of proof was on the claimant to show it was not reasonably practicable to bring an action within the three-month time limit;
If the claimant failed to discharge that burden of proof, his/her case would inevitably fail;
In this case, the claimant failed to attend the hearing and provide more evidence about his mental health; and
The Tribunal was right in concluding that the employee had failed to provide an adequate explanation for filing his claim outside the time limit ; and
The tribunal’s decision would be upheld.
The claimant’s appeal was therefore dismissed.

If you require further information contact us.

Email: enquiries@rtcoopers.com

RT COOPERS, 2005. This Briefing Note does not provide a comprehensive or complete statement of the law relating to the issues discussed nor does it constitute legal advice. It is intended only to highlight general issues. Specialist legal advice should always be sought in relation to particular circumstances.

Employment Law: Time Limits for Bringing Employment Tribunal Claims is a post from: Reference Education Center