I'm being sued by a friend

[colsanders]

I am being sued by a friend

My wife and I planned a vacation from New Jersey to Disney world with some friends, and due to financial complications we had to cancel the trip. We all got our money back for the deposit for the trip, but as for the plane tickets, we all knew that the tickets were non refundable. So all of us except for our one friend sold our tickets, and he then sent us a letter stating that if we did not pay him for the ticket he would seek legal action. We tried talking to him about it and he just completly blew us off. He cut off all communication with us and then three days before Christmas we received a letter from his lawyer that we had until Jan. 6 to pay him in cash. So Jan. 6 came and went and we still had heard nothing, so we thought that he gave up. Then on Feb. 14 he had filed for subpeonas and we recieved them on Feb. 28 to appear in Small Claims Court.
We have never had to go through this before and we do not know what to do, or if he even has a case.

Anybody able to help us?

[Edited by colsanders on 02-28-2001 at 11:30 PM]

 

[racer72]

Tell the judge what you just explained the your post. The only questions would be who arranged the trip and did one person collect all the money then purchase the plane tickets. If each person was responsible for paying for their individual airfare, then he assumed the responsibility of accepting the consequences when the trip was cancelled. But if the trip was arranged and someone took the responsibility purchasing all the tickets together, they may be liable for all or part of the fare when the trip was cancelled.