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When Laws Collide, You Need The Right Word

By Cathy Moran, Esq. Filed Under: lawyer skills

legal terms

As lawyers, words are our stock in trade. If we want to describe, explain, or persuade, we need to use the right word. The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter – ’tis the difference between the lightning-bug and the lightning.  MARK TWAIN I was blown away […]

Filed Under: lawyer skills

One Trait Makes A Bankruptcy Lawyer Great

By Cathy Moran, Esq. Filed Under: Counseling clients, lawyer skills

standout bankruptcy lawyer

One trait makes a bankruptcy attorney stand out. Bankruptcy forms promote the view that filing a case is just recording what the debtor owns and owes today.  If all you focus on is the here and now, you can assemble a bankruptcy petition. But if there is one, uniform failing in average bankruptcy lawyers, it’s that […]

Filed Under: Counseling clients, lawyer skills

Why Your Bankruptcy Client Doesn’t Understand You (And How To Fix the Problem)

By Cathy Moran, Esq. Filed Under: lawyer skills, Start Here

bankruptcy terms

Bankruptcy terminology, so familiar to lawyers, stymies clients. Even common English words seem to flumox our clients. We are a pair,  divided by our common language. Even without legal jargon, we talk past each other. Words at war How do we misunderstand each other?  Let me count the ways: Property:  I don’t have any property, […]

Filed Under: lawyer skills, Start Here

Hearsay Exception: How Do I Get This Into Evidence?

By Cathy Moran, Esq. Filed Under: Bankruptcy Practice, lawyer skills

hearsay exception

Quick: tell me everything you know about Federal Rule of Evidence 803(17)! If you’re like me, there’s deafening silence. I’ve apparently skated through forty years of bankruptcy practice without really considering how Kelly Blue Book figures get into evidence. If it worked, I just went on. (Hint: it’s FRE 803(17). But a change in California […]

Filed Under: Bankruptcy Practice, lawyer skills Tagged With: 2021, median home value

Objection: Hearsay

By Wayne Silver Filed Under: lawyer skills

trial practice

There you are, client on the witness stand, jury in the box, story being told on direct exactly the way you prepared her, things going just swimmingly. And then opposing counsel stands and utters those two lovely words…”Objection, hearsay.”  Huh? That’s ridiculous, you confidently think to yourself, just as you hear the trial judge say, […]

Filed Under: lawyer skills

Start with problem, not procedure

By Cathy Moran, Esq. Filed Under: lawyer skills

where to start

The new bankruptcy lawyer sent me an email. What do I file when there’s an objection to my client’s amended Chapter 13 plan:  notice a hearing? file a demurer? In her case, the form of the “objection” suggested the opposing counsel was as new to bankruptcy as the debtor’s lawyer. My advice? First:  figure out […]

Filed Under: lawyer skills

Prompt Full Disclosure from Bankruptcy Clients

By Cathy Moran, Esq. Filed Under: Before filing, lawyer skills, Start Here

interview trick

If the price of a bankruptcy discharge is full disclosure, some clients still want to underpay. No matter how carefully you script your initial interview with a client in quest of everything you need to know to advise them on bankruptcy, there will be some tidbit, relevant to your quest, that isn’t evoked with your […]

Filed Under: Before filing, lawyer skills, Start Here

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