Courts Can Penalize Attorneys Who Try To Assist Needy Pro Se
Claimants
Imagine yourself in a very common situation. Because of an on the job injury, you are disabled and for that reason without
a job and without income. You have filed
for and lost your social security disability claim. The only way you can now save your claim is
to file an appeal in federal court. If
you don't then all your accumulated and future disability benefits disappear. You cannot afford a full time lawyer to
prepare and file the appeal for you.
You decide to file the court appeal on your own. This is also
called filing "pro se".
Looking over the court rules booklet, you find that most of
the filings are routine forms that you can handle pretty much on your own.
The only help you need is on the brief itself; the argument
on your case that must be written and filed with the court.
You smartly think, why not simply hire an attorney to draft
the brief for you on a one time basis. You can then review
it, sign it and file it with the court. Then all you need to pay for is the short time
needed for that attorney to write the brief for you. This is commonly called "ghost-writing" and happens in all manners of business.
Sounds simple, right?
Sounds smart, right? After all the better your brief is, the better your chance of winning your claim.
Instead of filing a nonsensical poor man's brief with the Court,
you would be filing a sensible, legible brief that the Court can understand and
easily rule upon, thus saving the Court time and exasperation as well, right?
Well.....think again.
According to American Courts, you are forbidden from making
such a simple, smart, time and money saving action.
The US Supreme Court in Haines
v. Kerner, has held that pro se
pleadings are to be considered at "less stringent standards" (e.g., less
intelligent) that those drafted by attorneys.
Thus, according to American courts, since the "normal"
pro se litigant will be expected to write a less intelligent brief than as compared
to one written by an attorney, those pro se claimants who smartly thought to
hire an attorney to ghost write their briefs for them, have an unfair advantage
(e.g., they were smarter than the courts expected) over the "normal" pro se
claimant who did not think of hiring a ghost writer for their briefs.
As such American Courts have penalized and sanctioned the
attorneys who ghost write briefs and other legal pleadings for needy pro
se claimants; the very same claimants who most need and can least afford those
very same briefs and legal pleadings required to be filed by the Courts. ABA
11/30/2006
In summary, a pro se claimant, who thinks of the very smart idea
of hiring an attorney to assist her one time in drafting and preparing her
brief for filing in court, will be penalized for having the intelligence to do
so, over the "normal" pro se claimant who on her own files a nonsensical,
useless brief in that very same court.
Simply put, apparently under these rulings, the smarter you are in appearing on your own in an American Court, the more likely you will raise the Court's suspicion and the more likely you will be penalized. The "less intelligent" you as pro se claimant appear to be in your filings, the more trusting will be the Court toward you.
As such, for pro se claimants; American courts have restricted the ability of pro se claimants to appear and file pleadings in their claims to the lowest intelligence levels of pro se claimant. Those pro se claimant who think at any higher level to hire a ghost writer and submit an intelligent and competent brief on their claims will be penalized by the court.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the same coin; attorneys who are less experienced (e.g. less competent
and/or capable) in filing court appeals are completely free to retain and hire
attorney ghost writers to file briefs and pleadings for them on their claims in American courts
at will with no penalty.
