Lawyers In This Online Group Are Sharing The Moments They Knew People Had Messed Up Big Time (30 Stories)

I was representing Mom in a bitter custody fight. Dad wanted full custody and argued mom was an unfit parent. Mom wanted full custody because Dad had a history of domestic violence towards her and the kids.

Dad's lawyer was doing a good job of painting her in a bad light during his cross-examination, and I was starting to get worried. His lawyer brought a close family friend as a character witness for Dad, who said the usual nice things about Dad. Then he said something about them owning chickens. I thought that was odd so I asked more questions. I was able to get the friend to spill the beans that the Dad owned chickens for illegal cock fighting, and he'd take his minor children to these cock fights, and when the children were acting up, he'd punish them by forcing them to feed the chickens, during which they would get pecked and scratched by the chickens. And obviously, the children were terrified of those chickens.

I could see the color draining from Dad's lawyer's face. Mom got full custody.

IANAL and have told this story before but it is a good one.

I had a problem with my cell provider and my cell phone wasn't receiving a signal where my cottage is located even though it was clearly marked as an area that would receive a full signal on their map.

I went back to provider and told them of my problem and they gave me a different phone with the same results.

I then took back the phone and charger because they were useless to me at the time (this was over 20 years ago.) They then sued me.

In court I had a picture of the phone screen showing no bars while standing on my dock. Their lawyer argued that the picture could have been taken anywhere.

Then the judge piped up "i know where your cottage is, I have a cottage nearby. I switched providers because I could hardly get a signal where I am, there's no way you'll get a signal from x provider."

Then the judge ripped into the representative from the cell company and their lawyer. It was a good day.

I had client whose 60k car was ruined by a shop that put in the wrong oil. We couldn't prove it at first, the engine blew up, oil leaked out and evidence was lost. I subpoenaed their bank records, figured out they bought their oil from Costco. Called Costco and got the their prices for the last two years. I then worked out the amounts they were spending, did some backhand math, and showed based on the values it was impossible they had ever bought the right oil. They settled in full immediately.

My brother is a divorce attorney. His most memorable case, he was representing a guy in a divorce custody battle who was accused of horrific child abuse. Very graphic, very detailed depositions from the young kids against daddy. Things look grim.

Then my brother notices the deposition transcript (done by social workers under oath) contains a question at the end from one of the kids "Did I hit my marks?" My brother had previously tried to make it as an actor in Hollywood right out of high school, failing miserably (and decided to go into law, an altogether different form of "acting")....He wonders how little kids know about acting jargon. Subpoenas the wife's personal checking acct during discovery, sure enough, acting lessons.

Deposes an extremely sketchy "acting coach", and panicked coach quickly coughs up DVDs of "practice interrogations" with the kids, hours of coaching the kids on exactly what imaginary things to say about daddy.

He says it was his one and only "Perry Mason moment" in 20+ years of practice, and Dad got sole custody of the kids.

Not a lawyer but a legal videographer. This gentleman was claiming injuries/seeking damages against his employer after a fall at work. He claimed he couldn't raise his right arm above his shoulder because of the fall. First deposition comes along and I am hired by defendant's attorney to videotape deposition of the plaintiff. Anyone know THE FIRST THING a court reporter asks you to do in a deposition?

"Please raise your right hand and repeat after me..."

Plaintiff raises his right arm above his shoulder with ease and no sign of discomfort, does not occur to him what he has just done. Both attorneys were looking down at their notes when this happened and neither of them caught it. The plaintiff himself didn't catch it. The court reporter looked at him and then looked at me and her eyes went wide with realization at what just happened. 4 hours of deposition proceed where in the plaintiff is instructed (multiple times) to show his range of motion and precedes to pretend like he can't raise his arm above shoulder level which he did at the very beginning of his deposition. Deposition ends, plaintiff's counsel leaves, I call defense (hiring party) counsel over and show him the first 2 mins of tape, counsel excitedly whispers to me, "case closed, you just saved us tens of thousands of dollars". I got a $5,000 bonus and plaintiff's case was dismissed with prejudice.

Had a client accused of leading the cops on a high speed chase. The cop on the stand estimated he was going 90 mph, but never actually clocked him. Then the cop identified where the chase started with me, and where it ended. It lasted about 2 miles. Then we went through his log of when it started and when it ended. About three and a half minutes. Once you walk through the math on that, the average speed of this chase was 35 mph. Client got acquitted really quickly after that.

My client was a woman working at a meet packing plant. Her glove (they would only give her the loose kind because they were cheaper) got caught in the machine and she lost her arm. We sued the owners of the plant for the glove issue. We also sued the machine manufacturer for failing to include the required guard. Then we sued the distributor for being in the chain of the sale but didn’t really think they played much of a role. The manufacturer swore they included a hand guard and said the plant owner must have used a grinder to take it off. During a deposition of the guy that owned the distraction company he shows up with the sale documents he was supposed to have turned over weeks before.

Turns out there was a note in small print at the bottom he didn’t know about that said the sale was without the hand guard. Which is against the law. I pointed it out and we ended up settling that afternoon with the distributor. The woman got all her medical bills paid, got money for a prosthetic and got a bunch of pain and suffering damages.

I was suing a landlord who failed to make serious repairs in order to force the tenant out. The hard part is proving bad intent instead of mere idiocy so you get higher damages. Code Enforcement was involved, so I request those records. The landlord left a voicemail to the enforcement department saying to hold off on the fines, they will make the repairs as soon as the tenant is forced out. That was an easy case.

This is so petty - I've had much bigger moments, but because of the character of the other side this will always be my favourite. Doing a boundary dispute, a squabble over what was essentially a few inches of land. OS was a lawyer, and an absolute arsehole. He was acting for himself - the whole 'a lawyer who acts for himself has a fool for a client' thing was bang on for him. But he was a deeply unpleasant guy, a bully who thought that he was the smartest guy in the room.

Part of his case hinged on wheelie bins and how prior to the boundary having been moved there wasn't space to store a full size bin beside the house. The fact you now could meant clearly the boundary must have moved. That was the extent of his evidence, it really was thin stuff.

During the actual trial he pulled a fast one by suddenly producing an old aerial photo ostensibly to show the boundary at the front of the property had also moved (a fast one because you have to disclose stuff like that in advance, you can't just sit on something relevant and then suddenly whip it out at trial with a flourish). Whilst he was making his submissions that it should be admissable, I looked more closely at it, away from the bit of the boundary he said it was relevant to and realised that it very clearly showed a wheelie bin in exactly the spot his case said there couldn't be one. Told the judge we were happy for the photo be admitted after all, got the other side to confirm the date it was taken, then pointed out he'd just completely f**ked his case.

That photo did him for nearly 50k in adverse costs. Couldn't happen to a more deserving chap.

My client's house burned down from an explosion in the fuel oil tank used to heat the house. It was clearly the oil maintenance company's fault, but his homeowners insurance (from a very reputable company) still refused to pay out, citing a ridiculous technicality in his policy.

Essentially, the policy covered damage caused by the oil heater but they claimed that it was the storage tank that exploded and wasn't part of what was covered.

So they deny his claim, which was about 1.2 million, and then I get involved. During a deposition with the claims adjuster I ask how she came to the conclusion that the storage tank was not a part, or at least connected to, the heater. She states that she relied on her "expert witness" who was an engineer. Little did she know I had already checked this person's background. He had zero engineering experience or education.

As most of you might know, you don't get attorney's fees in most cases. However, when an insurance company denies your claim in "bad faith", now you do. Her little admission cost the company about 500k in fees, on top of the original claim for 1.2 million.

Not a lawyer, but when I was in the military I was accused of something I didn't do. And I had to go to court over it. And during court the prosecutor started to detail this investigation and how they had staked my apartment out for months. They entered into evidence a picture of "my apartment". And when they put it up I looked shocked at my lawyer bc it wasn't a picture of my place. It was my ex wifes apartment. A place I had NEVER lived (never even spent a single night there). I lived in a house, she lived in an apartment. And when my lawyer was asked if she objected to the picture being entered into evidence she replied "I don't mind them entering it into evidence as long as they change the listing of it". And when one of the members of the panel (no judge, 3 member board) asked what was wrong with the listing, she looked at him and said "That's not his apartment". On top of this the witness they used against me described going to my house on the night in question and she named the subdivision where she had visited me, except that wasn't where I lived either (also wasn't where the picture they had was either).

Case was dismissed and I was told they requested the witness to return to answer questions about perjury.

I was trying to get a restraining order for a woman in dv court from her son’s father. We are presenting testimony and she details a story where he grabbed her arm and slammed it on the tub- breaking her wrist. On cross, i asked the accused if he ever broke my clients wrist on purpose. His response- “f**k yeah i did. She was nine months pregnant about to smoke crack and wouldn’t stop, I tried to grab her arm to get the pipe and protect my unborn son”.

F**k me. She left that detail out in her conversations with me.

I acted for a plumber who ripped up a tile floor to replace a pipe. He installed new tile on top but warned the owners not to walk on it for 48 hours. He emphasized not to let their kids or their dogs walk on it either. They walked on it but alleged the defects were caused by improper install. We had an expert do a report which confirmed that it was consistent with proper installation but people walking on it too soon. Crazy homeowners still went to trial on it.

In their evidence disclosure they included a series of pictures. One of the pictures had in the foreground a tile that was tilted upwards. The background very clearly showed a dog’s paw pressing down on the other end of the tile. That wasn’t so much an I got them situation as they got themselves.

Someone told me this.

The lawyer was describing the theft. “The footprints make it seem as though he didn’t go to the basement”

And the defendant said, “Actually we did.”

Plaintiff alleged he was so injured in an auto accident that he couldn't work, do any regular activities, or pick up his young kids. He then posted on his public FB profile him doing the Ice Bucket Challenge. If you're not familiar, he basically lifted a huge cooler filled with ice water over his head. His attorney had no idea he had posted it.

Lady got into a minor fender bender with a truck in a casino parking lot (she backed out of a spot into him). My guy said she parked and went inside the casino for a few hours. At her deposition, she testified that she was so hurt she went right home and to a hospital. I asked if she was a frequent visitor of casino, and if she had a rewards card. She was happy to tell me she did and she had gold status, and showed me the card.

I subpoenaed her rewards cards records, and it showed she was playing slots for hours after the accident.

Cross examining a custom home builder who had a lump sum contract (set price as opposed to “cost plus” which means cost of the materials plus x% as builder fee) with the home owner. Claimed he put 20% more labor/materials in building the home than the contracted provided for and he was suing for these excess costs.

Was asking him about an email with my client negotiating the price of the construction and he volunteers that he knew he couldnt build it for that price.

My head snaps up, supervising partner’s head snaps up, and opposing counsel goes pale. Dialogue was something like:

Me: you quoted ‘x’ price? Builder: yes Me: you knew you couldn’t build it for that price? Builder: yes Me: you knew the home owner was relying on that quote? Builder:yes Me: you knew home owner wouldn’t have signed contract without that representation? Builder: yes Me: and you told home owner’s lender you could do it for ‘x’? Builder: yes Me: and bank relied on that price and wouldn’t have given loan if knew it was wrong? Builder: yes

This is textbook fraudulent inducement and he had no idea. Builder got poured out in the arbitration award and slapped builder with sizable punitive damages on top of it.

Five minutes of testimony sunk his case because he volunteered information without being prompted.

As a 18 year old computer store owner, I had a guy sue me because his computer was a "lemon". Well he chose to represent himself, to which the judge said only an idiot would represent himself, begged the guy to postpone and get a lawyer. Nope, so the guy rambled for 20min and made himself look like a complete redneck moron who just didn't know how to use computer.

So then it was my turn. My lawyer stood up and said some legal phrase to the effect of the plaintiff failed to ask for any damages, therefore we ask for summary dismissal. (Gravel bang). Granted, Mr. Plaintiff I told you that you needed an attorney.

Not a lawyer. Was taking my ex to court over custody of my kid. I had compiled a 150 page dossier complete with a report from child protective services since there was abuse in the household. Text messages and tons of records of contempt of our previous agreement. My daughter has a court assigned lawyer that is normal in these cases, which after reading through all the materials and talking to all the parties sided with my lawyer and I.

The ex decided to represent themselves because...hubris I suppose. Before the case was heard in the hallway outside of the court room she gave me an agreement she typed up which would grant me custody as well as some generous provisions for herself. I politely declined as we were confident we would be getting a lot more in trail.

Case was called. Testimonies in. She put on the most hilariously insane and embarrassing show for the court. In her closing testimony she attempted to hand the judge the agreement she tried to give us. Judge refused to take it. You can't just hand me things. That's not how you submit things into evidence. I'm not reading that.

She's arguing with the judge, yelling at him, and losing her s**t. In the insane nonsense she was spewing she said, "...and this agreement gives him custody which is one of the things he's after!" in what I assume was an attempt to show that she's attempting a compromise.

My lawyer peppers in a quick statement, "Ok, so you agree for the father to have full custody?" She snaps in heated anger, "Yes! That's what I agreed to!" Our side falls completely silent and the judge after much effort ends her little outburst. Gave his final verdict which started with granting me custody and putting her in court mandated therapy.

She literally gave away custody of her daughter in a heated argument with the judge.

Represented a DUI client who swore up and down to me he hadn’t been drinking or doing any drugs. Newbie officer who had his field training officer with him in the car. Rookie pulls client over for a tag violation, walks back to the car with body camera still on, training officer says “get him out for a DUI” and the rookie says “but he’s not intoxicated” to which the reply was “do it anyway.” Body cam clicks off, turns on 7 minutes later and they’re doing field sobriety exercises on my client. Client sat in custody for 3 weeks until I finally got the tape from the prosecutor and presented it to the judge. The “oh s**t” looks from the prosecutor and FTO when the judge saw the tape.....I’ll treasure that one. Judge wrote the police chief a letter saying the FTO was dead to him and he’d deny every search warrant he tried to bring thereafter for being a liar. Client is hopefully still on track with his civil attorney in a lawsuit.