Tanya Acker - Make Your Case: Finding Your Win in Civil Court

Praise for Make Your Case

by Tanya Acker

Tanya Acker lays out a common sense approach to deciding when to goor not to goto court. Make Your Case is straightforward and an invaluable resource from someone with the legal insight to tell it like it is.

Judge Judy Sheindlin

Civil court can be your first line of defense or your last avenue to justice in our legal system. Thats why its important that you know the process, the players, and the politics. Tanya Ackers Make Your Case offers the kind of knowledge and insight you wont find outside of law school. A must-read for everyone because you never know when youll need it.

The Honorable Anthony Daniels, Alabama House Minority Leader

Whether you want to get the guy next door to stop dumping his garbage on your lawn or vindicate your constitutional rights against the President of the United States, with Make Your Case , Tanya Acker has you covered.

Rebecca Buckwalter-Poza, Award-Winning Attorney, Political Strategist, and Journalist (who sued the President of the United States and won)

Do not go to court without first reading this book! Smart, funny, readable, and filled with information and advice that only someone who has seen court from many different angles can offer, Make Your Case prepares you for what to expect at every stage of the litigation process. After reading it, youll know the questions you should be asking your legal representativeand yourself. Ive spent most of my career teaching law, and I learned something from practically every page.

Omar Dajani, Professor of Law,
McGeorge School of Law, University of the Pacific

An extraordinary clinic for non-lawyers and lawyers alike on what realistically to expect when youre compelled to enter the uncertain, often scary, and frequently expensive arena of litigation. Tanya Ackers Make Your Case is an invaluable compass to help you get your bearings as you attempt a journey toward your win.

Chad Hummel, Co-Leader of the national trial practice at
Sidley Austin LLP, Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers

To Mom, Dad, Randy, and the Constitution.

You all are the greatest.

Copyright 2020 by Tanya Acker

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever.

For more information, email

Diversion Books

A division of Diversion Publishing Corp.

www.diversionbooks.com

First Diversion Books edition, October 2020

Paperback ISBN: 978-1-63576-701-8

eBook ISBN: 978-1-63576-688-2

Printed in The United States of America

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Library of Congress cataloging-in-publication data is available on file.

When the world shuts down, people in disputes with one another dont just automatically stop fighting and make peace. Some do, but many dont.

Many simply cannot. For many, a global pandemic, and the near shut-down of the world in an attempt to stem it, can make what were already difficult situations much worse. Expectations are frustrated. People are unsettled and redrawing their boundaries.

During that same periodnow, as I write thisa broad coalition is engaged around an issue with which many of us have long been familiar: the fact that the world can be far more dismissive, officious, brutal, or deadly if you are Black. Many American and global citizens are grappling with questions about how well the system works or whether it even works at all. Brutally stark examples of how it does not always confer to everyone the presumptive benefits of freedom and liberty, or value African-American lives as highly as others, have led to an important conversation about fairness and how to ensure it.

This book presumes a lot, not the least of which is some basic faith in the civic institutions that are supposed to hold us together in times of crisis. It presumes that just because I say so isnt a valid basis for compelling or restraining behavior and that those civic institutions can play a useful role in keeping just because I say so at bay when were notlets just saybeing our best selves. A diverse group of people who have to share space, who arent always inclined to see things in the same way, and who are laboring under pressures that will themselves make history, need to know there is a platform for resolving disputes that is more likely than not to play fairly. Court is one of those institutions, and having more information about court can help mitigate both blind faith and hopeless despair regarding how the process works. Either can be fatal to your search for justice.

I hope this helps.

Our Eternal, Timeless Brawls

I HAVE NO PISTOLS! LET HIM FIRE!
STAND OUT OF THE WAY AND LET THE ASSASSIN FIRE!

Senator Thomas Hart Benton to Senator Henry Foote in 1850, as Benton strode toward Foote on the Senate floor in objection to Footes remarks, and Foote pulled a gun on him.

What is something that all of usblue, red, purple, or otherwisehave in common? We file lawsuits. Millions of them.

We can fight with each other over just about anything. Someone lies or someone else thinks they did. Someone claims theyre owed money and someone else thinks theyre being extorted. Someones circumstances change and they find themselves unable to do something they previously thought they could. Someone thinks they delivered a masterpiece and someone else thinks their nine-year-old kid could have done better.

Plus, neither life, nor you, are perfect. Youll enter into an agreement and not think of everything. You will think youve covered all your bases, but you may let some things slip, thinking that everyone is working on the same page and toward the same objectives. Maybe youll be too easygoing about something, or believe that the pressures youre under require that you not make an issue of things you ordinarily do. You wont always be on your let-me-make-sure-there-is-absolutely-no-way-they-can-come-after-me game. Youll be surprised when you thought everyone was on the same page and someone conjures a way to cry foul, or actually has a way of doing so.

And all of that is just on a good day. Add to that a near shutdown of the world because of a global pandemic and you get mathematical magican already infinite number of reasons for disputes somehow seems to multiply:

• Your state or local government issues a stay-at-home order, requiring that all but essential businesses cease operating. Your business is considered non-essential. You disagree.
• Your state or local government does not issue a stay-at-home order but your boss refuses to let you wear a mask at work. You think hes playing Russian roulette with your life.
• The lockdown prohibits you from joining other congregants in your church for in-person services. You believe the order is unconstitutional.
• The government denies you COVID-19 relief funds because your spouse is undocumented. You believe this is unconstitutional.
• Your parent was in a nursing home where a COVID-19 outbreak took place. No one at the facility told you anything in advance and you dont think they did enough to protect residents from harm.
• Your company is forced to close down so youre not getting a paycheck, which means you cant pay your rent. You may get several months grace period, but its not like youre going to grow new money after you havent been working for months. Oh, and the landlord still didnt fix the pipes.