Tonight! Liar's Poker! The Things Lawyers Do to Present Their Alleged Client in the Best Light

THE NEIL GARFIELD SHOW

Lawyers have a job. Their job is to do the best they can at advancing their client's position-- within the bounds of the law. This usually involves a fair amount of bluff and any successful lawyer will tell you that it requires a great deal of knowledge, only part of which is imparted (and even less retained) in law school. Tonight we will talk about how lawyers bluff their way through any case. And the most effective way of doing that is by asserting facts or laws that have never been introduced into the case. In some cases, those facts and those laws will never be introduced. But if the lawyer is good at bluffing, the opposing lawyer will fail to object or challenge the assertion. In the mind of the judge, a human being, the fact is then firmly established as true. The die is cast. This is particularly true in foreclosure litigation. A lawyer stands up and says his name and says that he represents the claimant that has either been named as Plaintiff in a judicial foreclosure or as Defendant in a nonjudicial state where the homeowner must file the claim against the forced sale of homestead property. The fact that this lawyer has never spoken to any officer or employee of the named claimant does not stop him or her from asserting that he or she is the authorized legal advocate for the named claimant. That is a bluff and it is hard to overcome until later, at best. That lawyer knows that the trust, even if could be construed as technically existing, has never received a single payment from the homeowner and never will. So tonight's show is devoted to bluffing and what homeowners can do about it. Spoiler Alert: you probably need a lawyer of your own to counteract the effect of bluffing by the lawyer for the "foreclosure mill."