Help: Out of State Suit - Eldery Man in SC

[bradlm]

A friend is being sued in a TX court. He lives in SC. He sold event tickets in advance via telephone but did not receive them and refunded the person's money. The plaintiff didn't cash the refund check and is seeking 4x the amount paid, due to loss of markup he'd have made from reselling the tickets (going rates).

My friend is elderly, low-income, Veteran living paycheck to paycheck on social security. He can't afford an attorney, much less travel to TX.

I intended to draft a response for him requesting dismissal for wrong venue. I was also going to request he self represent via mail, if possible. I called the court and they said the response would not be read by the Judge until the day of the hearing. Which... sort of defeats the requests.

Make me wonder if someone could just sue a bunch of old folks across the country and get judgments awarded due to no-shows and then get leans on real property. Sounds far fetched. What am I missing?

Any suggestions appreciated.

 

[Proserpina]

A friend is being sued in a TX court. He lives in SC. He sold event tickets in advance via telephone but did not receive them and refunded the person's money. The plaintiff didn't cash the refund check and is seeking 4x the amount paid, due to loss of markup he'd have made from reselling the tickets (going rates).

My friend is elderly, low-income, Veteran living paycheck to paycheck on social security. He can't afford an attorney, much less travel to TX.

I intended to draft a response for him requesting dismissal for wrong venue. I was also going to request he self represent via mail, if possible. I called the court and they said the response would not be read by the Judge until the day of the hearing. Which... sort of defeats the requests.

Make me wonder if someone could just sue a bunch of old folks across the country and get judgments awarded due to no-shows and then get leans on real property. Sounds far fetched. What am I missing?

Any suggestions appreciated.

What you're missing is that you're risking practicing law without a license.

What your friend needs to do is file to have the suit dismissed due to lack of jurisdiction. If the plaintiff wants to sue, he needs to sue where your friend lives.

 

[bradlm]

Proserpina, thanks for sharing. Didn't know about practicing law - looked it up so will keep that in mind in the future.

Helped my friend write his letter to respond. Not going to pursue the dismissal with him but suggested he look into it. He probably won't so nothing else going to happen and he isn't going to TX so .... we'll see.

I wonder now if anyone could just sue people far away that are unable to respond (older, incapable, no $, etc), and win default judgments all over the place. Doesn't seem right.