Limited Scope is a beneficial arrangement for clients who wish their attorney to perform only some of the duties required for their case, while the client performs the other duties.
Limited Scope agreements are unique to each client, crafted to the client’s needs and desires. An initial consultation is required to assess your needs, discuss the various options, and to ensure the client is fully aware of the depth of responsibility they are accepting.
Some of the services you can retain the Law Office of Melissa A. Atteberry to perform include:
Things the Law Office of Melissa A. Atteberry shall 'not' do in a Limited Scope arrangement.
Collaborative Law is a process of family law resolution that is intended to reduce or eliminate conflict. Unfortunately, many who are facing a potentially contentious family law matter, such as a divorce or child custody dispute, have been conditioned to believe that the only process available is for each party to retain their own attorney and effectively "punch it out" in the courtroom.
This traditional and adversarial approach often leads to substantial collateral damage. Finances can be devastated. Animosity and anger can be generated and may take a lifetime from which to recover. Children can be left feeling alone or worse yet, put in the middle, unimportant or unloved.
The collaborative process seeks to remedy this by focusing on what is truly important to each party and what they have in common with the other, rather than attempting to exploit the differences.
Contentious testimony and litigation are not part of the collaborative process. Instead, each party meets with their own attorney and communications coach, together with other neutral professionals as needed, such as child and financial specialists, to negotiate a settlement that is tailored to the needs of the family, not to the needs of legal precedent.
A successful collaborative process results in a "best case" scenario of maintaining thriving relationships between people who are inextricably linked in many ways but wish to begin living separate of others.
Mediation may feel like a new idea, but it's increasingly well-known and widely accepted. In a mediation, the parties meet with a neutral mediator. With the mediator's guidance, the parties work through the issues to enable them to resolve their dispute.
Mediation is flexible, voluntary, and confidential. Nothing shared in mediation can be used by either party outside the mediation process. The mediator remains neutral between the parties, which means the mediator won't give advice to either party and also can't act as a lawyer for either party. What the mediator can do, though, is explain to both parties’ issues to be aware of about what they're trying to accomplish. That open and free exchange of information allows both spouses to negotiate with each other in confidence. Because both spouses are working with the same base of information, it usually takes far less time to negotiate a resolution that is acceptable to both parties.
A summons, petition, and sometimes additional moving papers are filed in court to seek relief. Next, the other side will reply. Information is usually exchanged once the legal case begins, which is referred to as the Discovery process
After discovery, the courts often require a settlement conference to see if the case can be settled before trial. If the parties can't reach settlement, the case goes to trial.
In order to avoid trial, one or both parties often make settlement offers prior to the trial (which are often costly and protracted). If settled, the litigation ends – if not, a trial will be scheduled, which can take months to complete. Judges preside over family law trials.
In a trial, both parties present relevant and admissible evidence to support their claims. Once the trial ends, the judge must decide any disputed issues. After the Court rules, the losing party can appeal.
Can’t find what you’re looking for? Simply call our friendly staff on (530) 895-8932.
Phone: (530) 895-8932
Fax: (530) 895-0484
Email: melissa.atteberrylaw@gmail.com
Address: 1550 Humboldt Rd., Suite #1 Chico, CA 95928
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