represent yourself in court and save lots of money

It costs a lot of money to hire a lawyer to represent you in court whether for a criminal case or a family law case or a civil case. The client assumes that the lawyer is competent and knows what they are doing. However there are a lot of lawyers who are good at convincing people that they know what they are doing, but in fact are incompetent and almost useless. Recently I needed the help of a lawyer and a legal aid lawyer visited me and I wanted his help to make an application to the court. But the next day I was informed that the lawyer wouldn't be representing me because there was no funding from legal aid for him to appear. He didn't tell me himself, but I found out on the court day from the prosecutor. I found out later that he was hopeless and didn't believe my application would be successful. However, when you are desperate, you are grateful for any help you can get. So I decided to make the application myself. The police opposed it, but I was successful. And you can be too, if you know what to do. I used to be a lawyer and there were times when I suggested to my clients that they represented themselves because I believed they would do better for themselves than I could. My reason for this was because in Australia, the courts have a duty to assist self-represented litigants and often the Judges pay closer attention to self-represented people than they do to lawyers. In this case, it turned out well and the client did a lot better than I would have been able to do for him. Judges switch off when lawyers start speaking to them. Some people have no choice but to represent themselves because they either don't qualify for legal aid or they can't afford the services of a lawyer. If you are in this situation, then I can help you. I have written a self-help manual called "How to represent yourself in court (criminal case)" You can find it on www.knowledgetohelpyou.bigpixie.com

marriage: for better or ?

Nowadays it seems that marriage vows are not kept much. Two people who are in love look into each others eyes and promise to love each other for better or for worse, for richer or for poorer, in sickness and in health until death does part them. However in practice what they really mean is I will stick with you while things are going well, but as soon as things happen that I don't like, I will leave. When I was a family lawyer, I often had clients who were the father or the mother, and who now had a lot of anger and hostility toward their former partner. I often used to think that there used to be a time when you loved that person, and now look at how things are. All of us are looking for love. We all want someone who will love and accept us for who we think we are. But some of us are selfish and want everything our way. In a real relationship there are two people who both deserve to have their needs met. So neither of them is going to get everything they want all the time. It is a matter of two different people learning to give and to take, learning to live together and adjusting to each other's mannerisms and needs and quirks and desires. It is also very important to try to keep romance alive. Often when we first meet we are romantic with flowers and chocolates and holding hands and hugs and nice times together, but after we become partners or get married it all stops and we settle into a routine. This is not good. We must both strive to maintain romance to keep the flame of love burning. It is important to have good priorities. God first, husband and wife or partner second, children third, work fourth and so on. If we have wrong priorities then important relationships begin to suffer. Work should never come before relationship between partners. Marriages are like plants which need water and sunlight to thrive. Relationships need quality time. It is lovely to see old couples who are still in love with each other after 50 or more years of marriage. Rough and hard times will come, and it is at those times that we need the support of someone who loves us and cares about us. Marriages and relationships can become deeper and better as both people go through the hard times together and unitedly come through. There is that great little story called "footsteps" where a man had a dream that he and God were walking together on a beach leaving two tracks of footsteps in the sand. He noticed that there were times when there was only one set of footsteps at the hardest and most difficult times of life. He said to God: "Why did you leave me when things got hard and difficult?" God answered and said: "I didn't leave you, it was at those times that I carried you." There are moments in life when our work can't help us and when money can't help us, and we need strong loving relationships. These relationships require work and effort and giving to develop. Commitment is the key and faithfulness. Every one wants a partner who is faithful, but how few there seem to be. Its when the going gets tough that we discover who our friends really are.

Some lawyers are incompetent and uncaring

There are many lawyers who are uncaring and incompetent. They are only interested in themselves and the money they make. They do a lousy job representing their clients. An example is the childrens court where decisions are made about interim accommodation orders and final orders affecting who children live with. I have seen a production line occur in court where the same lawyers swap places with each other around the bar table and the Judge makes orders in quick succession and people's lives are irrevocably altered, often for the worse, and the only ones who benefit are the lawyers and the Judge. If a lawyer comes along who actually cares about their client and tries to represent them properly, it upsets the production line. Suddenly more time is needed to deal with the case and the Judge gets upset and the production line lawyers get upset. Pressure is exerted upon this recalcitrant lawyer who dares to upset the system.
The sad thing is that the client who relies so heavily on his or her lawyer, doesn't know that they are not being represented  properly. They may express gratitude to the lawyer who just sold them up the river.
Lawyers get tired and want to go home or have a drink or something else, so they reach agreements among themselves and then try to pressure their clients into accepting the deal telling them that it is the best they can hope for. I think lawyers lose sight of the fact that their clients are putting a lot of trust in them and that they really should try to be worthy of that trust. It is when a lawyer needs a lawyer that that lawyer realises how much trust people put in their lawyer. It is not often that you meet a lawyer who really cares about their clients. I used to be a lawyer and I did know some lawyers that really cared and tried hard, but they are in the minority in my experience. I think sometimes some clients would do better at court if they represented themselves. Clients will always do better representing themselves than using incompetent lawyers.
I have written a self-help manual called "How to represent yourself in court (criminal case)". This manual is available on www.ebay.com.au at the moment. It is written to help the person who does not qualify for legal aid and who cannot afford the cost of a private lawyer. It will help them do better at court.
Another thing lawyers like to do is to try to get the public to believe that they really do need their services when they go to court. Now it is true that a lot of lawyers do know how the court functions better than a lot of non-lawyers do. However in Australia and in some other countries, people have the right to represent themselves if they want to. Judges know this, but big pressure is applied to try to force self-represented people to get lawyers. This could be because the Judges know they have a duty to assist self-represented people and they don't want to or couldn't be bothered, or because they really think self-represented people can't really be successful unless they have a lawyer. I suspect the former rather than the latter.
Lawyers like to try to convince people that they can't possibly succeed in court without their services. They are live the priesthood used to be when the Bible wasn't written in the language spoken by the common people. They needed the priests to read it and explain it to them. Everything changed when the common man was able to read it for himself. So it is with the law. All a law degree does is to teach a little bit of a lot of different areas of law and how to find things. A motivated non-lawyer can sometimes do better than a lawyer.

what is justice?

The definition of justice seems to be personal to each of us. Often on the tv news after a court case, the reporters will interview family of the victim who will make statements about whether "justice" has been done. No matter how long a murderer might be locked up in jail, some family believe that "justice" has not been done because the murderer is still alive whereas the victim is dead. In other cases family believe that a long prison term means "justice" has been done.
In our society if a person is charged by the police with offending, we often believe that the person must be guilty of offending or the charges wouldn't have been laid. Until it happens to us. There are many people who have been found guilty of crimes and put in prison or punished, when they were actually innocent. An example is Lindy Chamberlain who was imprisoned for murdering her baby Azariah. Later it was found that a dingo had taken the baby. At the time when she was found guilty, many people thought "justice" had been done. She spent several years in jail. Was that justice?
After the second world war, the Nuremberg trials were held for several high ranking members of the Nazi government including Herman Goering who was head of the German Luftwaffe (airforce). Goering stated that this was victor's justice. If the Germans had won the war, then it might have been high ranking members of the allied governments that might have been put on trial and accused of war crimes. Justice is a matter of perception.
Is it just for a man to have his means of earning a living taken away from him and for him not to receive $80,000 of income earnt by him, before he had been charged with anything at all? Is it just for him to have his name slandered in public in inaccurate newspaper reports? Is it just for the police to contact his employer to try to make him unemployed when this had nothing whatever to do with their charges? Is it just for the police to try to poison his personal relationships? Is it just for him to have his money taken away? All of this happened to a man before the charges even went to court.
This is an example of the Australian Injustice System. Our society trumpets the mantra "innocent until proven guilty", but in practice it is "guilty until proven innocent". What if this man successfully defends himself against all of the charges? He won't get his business back or his $80,000 or his reputation from all those who believed the inaccurate newspaper reports or the job the police lost for him or the money he spent in attending court in another state. Is this justice?
I have been to court many times as a lawyer and I truly believe that it would be far better for people to stay out of court. I have seen many people get into the witness box and swear to tell the truth and then lie their heads off. I have seen Judges believe well dressed liars and disbelieve not so well dressed truth tellers. Terrible and unjust decisions have been and still are being made by courts. People commit dreadful crimes and then get lenient penalties because of their bad childhood or their drug dependency or something else. What about the man who was bashed in front of his family in a road rage attack? What about his children who had to witness this crime against their most loved father? What about the wife as she watched helplessly while in the car with the children? What would be justice for them?
The Judge is just a human being with feelings and needs and prejudices just like the rest of us. Sometimes good decisions are made. Sometimes the law is upheld. Often decisions are made according to their feelings and then justified by the law.
If you want to win your case, don't go to court. Try to settle before it gets to court. Even really wealthy people who can afford the top notch lawyers don't always win. There are many people in jail who are innocent. What is justice for them? Can the years taken from them in prison be given back to them?
What is justice for me may not be justice for you.

forgiving someone who has offended you

Forgiveness is important so that you don't become bitter, but forgiveness and reconciliation are different.
I can forgive someone who has hurt me and who has died, but I can't be reconciled with them. I might forgive someone who hurt me very badly, but for safety's sake, I won't be reconciled with them. However God wants to be reconciled with all of His sinful creatures and He achieves this through the death and resurrection of His Son Jesus Christ. He saves us from our sins. We become reconciled to Him. He forgives me and I am reconciled to Him. I promise to change and not sin again, and He helps me to be able to do this by changing me with His Holy Spirit.

re-building trust after failure

It is very hard to rebuild trust in a relationship after you have failed. Forgiveness is vital. The offended person has to be able to forgive the offender. The offender has to promise not to reoffend and must make sure that they don't. The offender must do everything possible to rebuild the relationship with the offended. But it is the offended person who has been hurt and wounded. Even when we say we are sorry, it doesn't take away the wound which needs time to heal. If I stabbed you causing a wound, I might say I am very sorry and that I will never do it again, but the other person is still wounded and in pain. Saying sorry doesn't take away the pain. The wound must be given time to heal. Forgiveness is vital for successful healing. We find the definition of forgiveness in the Bible. God forgives sinners. Why? Because the penalty for their sins has been fully paid. When Jesus Christ suffered and died on the cross, He paid God's full penalty for our sins. God can't hold our sins against us, because the penalty has been paid. So He forgives us, which means that He relates to us as though we were perfectly righteous and had never sinned against Him. For us as people therefore, forgiveness means relating to each other again as though the bad thing had never happened. But it also involves repentance on the part of the offender, which means that he or she will promise never to do it again, and will also change their life so that it doesn't happen again. We can't use God's forgiveness as a licence to go out and sin against Him again. So in our relationships, if we have offended, we must promise to change permanently and then must set about doing something to make sure that we do change. Unfortunately, to build new trust, the offended person must try trusting the offender again to see if he or she has changed. If they have then that is good. If they haven't, then that shows they weren't genuine.