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Tuesday, July 22, 2008
Courts - "Ohio Judges See More Do-It-Yourself Divorces and System Slowdown "
A long AP article today, posted by Law.Com, reports:
With the economy down and the cost of lawyers high, more people are choosing to represent themselves in divorce cases. But legal amateurs who struggle with complicated paperwork are slowing down an already clogged system, some judges say. * * *Indiana has taken a different route. The Supreme Court several years ago created a self-service legal center online, with divorce and other court forms, information on how to find a lawyer, etc.Legal information is widely available in bookstores and on the Internet for couples looking to save money. Legal fees for the simplest dissolution, not involving children, are about $1,000, Columbus, Ohio-area lawyers say. Dissolutions with children start around $1,500. * * *
Self-representation is an absolute right. But it slows an already-clogged system that isn't designed for amateurs, said Judge James Mason of Franklin County Domestic Relations Court.
"It's an ever-increasing problem," Mason said. "Some of these cases just need so much massaging."
His bailiff estimates that pro se filings, relatively unusual a decade ago, now amount to more than a third of Mason's cases.
"There's definitely more self-represented people, but I wouldn't say it's bogging us down," said Lisa Dwenger, administrator of the Hamilton County Court of Domestic Relations in Cincinnati. "I would say it is challenging for magistrates and judges because they have to hold them (pro se filers) to the same standards as attorneys, and that's difficult because they don't have the same training." * * *
Dwenger said the Ohio Supreme Court is helping county court administrators deal with the problem of pro se filers seeking free legal advice.
"What tends to happen is that a self-represented person tends to ask more questions of our staff," she said.
Staff may direct unrepresented filers on certain procedures but cannot offer legal advice. The Supreme Court sent a representative to Cincinnati for a workshop on how to deal with questions, Dwenger said.
"We try to do what we can to keep our people from saying the wrong thing," she said.
Mason said domestic court officials in Franklin County plan to set up a center at the court this year to provide information on self-representation, initially offering packets on simple cases such as uncontested divorces and dissolutions without children.
A quick search has not turned up similar state-court sponsored, official self-help legal sites in Ohio, Illinois or Kentucky. However, an ILB entry from Sept. 4, 2007 quotes from a LCJ story that Legal Aid in Louisville is offering do-it-yourself divorce packets.
Posted by Marcia Oddi on July 22, 2008 09:13 AM
Posted to Courts in general