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The million dollar question asked by almost every client we have. Nobody wants to go to court and lose!
The same is true of lawyers who go to court. I can personally attest to the awful feeling that you get as a lawyer when a clients court case has ended unsuccessfully. It is a horrible feeling, even when you thought the chances of success were slim.
Nevertheless, lawyers are asked to give their legal opinion on the merits of a persons case. We are asked to evaluate the chance of success and are directly asked “will I win in court“.
It is always a difficult question to answer and the answer will change over time. That’s because when you start a court case a lawyer doesn’t know all the facts and evidence yet. Whilst our own clients can provide some evidence, they don’t know what the other side has. We only know once the pleadings are completed and disclosure is made.
Take a read of our civil litigation page to find out what ‘pleadings’ and ‘disclosure’ mean and how they fit into to litigation process.
You’ll see that they happen after you’ve already made the decision to go to court. That means any advice we give you to help make the decision is generally only based on what we know at the time. Whilst we can contemplate what the arguments against you might be, we can’t be sure.
That doesn’t mean our advice is guesswork though. Because we focus on civil litigation, we deal with court proceedings and claims day in day out. So our assessment of the merits of you particular case, and how it might go in court receives the benefit of our past experiences litigating similar claims.
The legal merit of your claim is not the only thing you should think about. Others things to consider when deciding to go to court or not, include:
Weighing up all the factors to make a decision to go to court or not is not easy and it will be different for every person as they’ll add more weight to one factor than others. A lawyer cannot (and should not) make the decision for you, it is yours to make and I hope this article has given you some food for thought in making your decision to go to court or not.
Take a look around our website at the practice areas we focus on and be sure to read up about why you might want to choose us as your lawyer.
If you’d like to meet us and chat about your legal matter then get in touch a book a an appointment.
DISCLAIMER: The above article was written at a specific point in time in the past and is provided as general guidance only. It is not intended to be specific legal advice to any person’s particular circumstances who may be reading it. We do not recommend you use this article as a replacement for obtaining proper legal advice on your issue and encourage anyone reading the article to obtain legal advice to ensure the above information and guidance remains valid and suits your particular circumstance. In our experience, there is no ‘one size fits all’ to legal problems!