An injury can happen in an instant. Physics and Biomechanics demand that speed and weight combine to cause catastrophic results when governed by human recklessness and indifference … From car and truck accidents to dangerous unregulated or under-tested products, to animal attacks, even reckless/malicious internet trolling, the law of a civilized country demands that the victim(s) be compensated in terms of enough money to make the victim(s) whole relative to the damage done and the gross recklessness of the actions that caused the injury. It was realized even before the Law of Moses that the foundation of civilization had to be fair compensation in money damages for injury(ies) and not blood feuding and revenge. The Law of Moses expounded upon that belief and since ancient times the civilizations that have flourished have centered on just compensation for injury(ies). When an incident of injury and damage occurs, it is paramount that the people close to the injured party and the injured party if he or she is able, act quickly and decisively to pin down statements, the scene if there is one, that you take pictures of everything from every angle and every perspective, and that every statute that might be applicable to what happened is reviewed and addressed with an eye toward determining what amount of money will make the injured person whole, and in some cases, what amount of money will make an entire family, devastated by the injury, whole. Proper and complete compensation is the only closure acceptable to the victim(s) of injury due to no fault of their own. Unfortunately in today’s world of irresponsibility and blaming others or circumstances, that almost always requires a lawsuit. What to do, what to do??? Filing A Lawsuit Today, really mandated and do so immediately. Civil Procedure makes the start of litigation easy because it is the backbone of civility for it to be easy to seek to be made whole in a manner other than retribution and family feuding. But as is the case in most complicated matters, the devil is in the details. Filing a lawsuit has to be combined with through investigation, experts when needed, analysis and research. A large percentage of lawyers do not want to dedicate the time and effort involved in properly preparing a personal injury lawsuit to maximize recovery. R. Keith Prater, 770-253-7778. Maximizing a Verdict Act quickly. The most important thing to do immediately is to secure the evidence – within hours, the same day, if you or your family can do it. Take more pictures than you think you should. Get the investigating officer’s name and all the witnesses. Go to the scene and take pictures. Take pictures of the injury. And … ABOVE ALL ELSE … get a real injury lawyer, not a TV talking head – an actor representing someone you will probably never meet in person or even talk to, involved in your case. R. Keith Prater, 770-253-7778 Ask your physician questions: Treatment is critical, you must seek medical care to return to your old self as soon as possible so that your injury can be quantified in terms of permanent damage, future medical care, long term chronic problems. In several cases over the past 27 years I have had clients feel perfectly fine at the scene, and therefore, forgo going to the hospital in an ambulance — this can be a mistake. In the several cases, where the impacts were severe, injury was masked by adrenaline and the next day my client(s) felt terrible: In two instances that readily come to mind, fractured vertebrae were discovered, fractures that could have caused paralysis and even death during the night after my clients told the investigating officer that they thought they would be okay! Only trained medical professionals can tell injuries when the dazed and confused present after a collision. If you prove to be uninjured or mildly banged up, the visit is a source of evidence for both your attorney and an insurance company and the wreck can’t be used against you in the future if you are in another one. Continuity: If you are injured, and your doctor recommends treatment, then do it! It is a mistake to forego treatment and it will be used against you in the immediate claim and in the future! It is a bad mistake to end treatment before a physician tells you it has run its course. Cooperate: Your personal injury attorney will need your full and complete cooperation to get your claim maximized in terms of money – you must be totally candid and honest and remember that too many details does not exist! Write it down! All of it! R. Keith Prater, 770-253-7778 Contact the Law Offices of R. Keith Prater, P.C. to File a Personal Injury Claim @ 770-253-7778; to recover the full monetary compensation that you deserve from being injured due to no fault of your own. To schedule a consultation with your Atlanta Metro Area personal injury lawyer, call R. Keith Prater at 770-253-7778. Also, please visit our website and other blogs just by Googling “Pratlaw”.

Naive or Knucklehead: Divorce Settlement Agreements

Okay: I was raised an Army Brat and my Father and Mother and their friends used the old fashioned term, "Knucklehead", a lot almost always in a laughing conversation about either themselves or a mutual friend who had done something silly or daft. I thought the term applied to the subject matter of this post, so I posted a picture of one of the most beautiful motorcycle engines ever built and one that is highly sought after and is very expensive; and the engine's name is the "Knucklehead". I heard it routinely at the parties Mom and Dad threw and those they took me to, there were a lot of parties on weekends in the Army, until I was old enough to stay home. It was both a term of endearment and depending on context, one asserting stubbornness to a fault, ignorance, a lack of thought, usually used in a good humored way. With that said, I have seen some of the most god-awful divorce agreements seeking to be modified that in almost every case are presented by a prospective client who is well educated, and earning an above average income. How in the world they decided to sign an agreement without an attorney's advice and counsel is bewildering, still beyond me to comprehend. Alimony for life with no ability to modify for any reason ~ Wow! Joint custody that is not joint at all but is completely ones-sided with no support despite dramatically disparate incomes ~ college with no cap on the amount to be paid ~ Wow! Please: Don't do your own dentistry, surgery, engineering or legal work if you are not working in your profession and even then don't do it!

PREPARATION, PREPARATION AND A ROADMAP TO SUCCEED

Lawyer Robert Prater | Lawyer Divorce

WE MOVED TOWARD SHARPSBURG & PEACHTREE CITY!

 We moved our office last month to 1665 Hwy 34 E, Suite 300, Newnan, GA  30265.  Yes, that address is in The Summit Professional Park.  We are just west of The Healthplex - across a parking lot in the new building in the Park.  We are proud to be neighbors of The Healthplex, The YMCA and The Delta Credit Union.  We love it out here in Coweta County as close to Peachtree City as we are to Newnan. Call us today for an appointment if you have need of an Attorney or Lawyer:  

770-253-7778

THE CONTESTED DIVORCE: FIGURING OUT THE PRESENTATION

Law, Witnesses, Documentary Evidence are the ingredients of every case.  The Attorney is responsible for knowing the Law.  The client for knowing the Witnesses and the Evidence.  Once these ingredients are accumulated the Lawyer then becomes the Producer, Director and Creator of the product that will be presented to the Judge or Jury.  A simple analogy is that of baking a cake:  Ingredients coordinated incorrectly and baked at the wrong temperature will not yield a good result.  A recent case of alienation presented us with a mess:  Too many witnesses, too many documents; no episodic evident, just a myriad of anecdotes, insinuations, nasty but short comments; an attitude, however, that clearly presented created a mosaic of bad conduct that in turn was a clear picture of a campaign of parental alienation.  The problem presented was how to Produce the presentation to be effective and not the proverbial 'herding cats' debacle that would quickly turn into boring mush that would bring the Judge's instruction "I've heard enough of this now let's move on" which would in turn cast the remaining numerous anecdotes with insignificance and then immateriality.  It is the Attorneys job to correctly meld the witnesses and documents to present a clear and dynamic presentation to the Judge and, or, Jury.  That task is not easy and will not happen without significant reflective thought about how to do it effectively and clearly with the ultimate goal being to present the case with simple ringing truth without browbeating everyone in the Courtroom.  Experience and dedication at every turn is invaluable.

Jury Convicts Executive in Mortgage Fraud Case - WSJ.com

Jury Convicts Executive in Mortgage Fraud Case - WSJ.com

Call Prater & Craig today: 770-253-7778:

ILLEGAL ALIENS HAVE HUMAN RIGHT TO WAGES & CONTRACT(S)

March 23, 2011: District of Massachusetts issued an order in Lin v. Chinatown Restaurant Corp. denying the defendants' motion to compel the plaintiffs to respond to written discovery about their immigration status and in so doing asserted that the status of the Plaintiffs under the immigration act was irrelevant.  

The Court held that the status of the Plaintiffs was irrelevant under the cited case, the 2002 U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Hoffman Plastic Compounds, Inc. v. NLRB  because that case concerned the National Labor Relations Act and not the Fair Labor Standards Act because the adjudication of an FLSA cause of action does not call upon the court to make a discretionary policy-or interest-balancing assessment.  Basically the holding upholds an aliens right to pursue damages for wrong done and does not allow that right to be trumped by status:  Fair and Balanced trumps conniving and inequity.

Why Isn't Wall Street in Jail? | Rolling Stone Politics

  |PRATLAW| broadcasts: Apparently there will be very few if any repercussions over the collusion and fraud that caused the financial meltdown year before last. The media strangely seem completely uninterested in the unraveling the story and exposing the crooked world of Wall Street. I would venture to say that that world is populated by friends and family of the talking heads, producers, and executives that control mainstream media. So we have to rely on rags like Rolling Stone to light a dim candle. The same kind of back room back scratching went on at our local banks. If you got hurt don't let the statute of limitations, 2 years, run before you talk to a lawyer about it. Here's the link to the article that started this tirade: Why Isn't Wall Street in Jail? | Rolling Stone Politics

WEIRD CASES| What do Jurors think?

Breach of fiduciary duty cases illustrate what damages are all about. Sexual relations between consenting adults are probably not great damages cases and rely heavily on the victim's ability to communicate and the way they do it in front of an audience. Just how vulnerable was the victim is also a critical issue. My damages professor always illustrated the dilemma a jury has to confront by asking us to consider a bad facial injury to a hobo who spends his life down by the train terminal warming his hands over a burn barrel and the same injury to a famous fashion model ~ then he asked us to debate "do you really think a jury of twelve intelligent citizens are going to give the bum the same amount of pain and suffering they give the model?"

Law.com: Prior Suit May Signal Fate of Cases Against Ga. Megachurch Pastor

Report gives stimulus package high marks

The TARP bail out of the Financial Industry has apparently been a huge success. I didn't need the Washington Post to tell me that, however. A quick review of my meager stock portfolio which has more than doubled since TARP wen into effect [and the President took office]. Had the President been a more effective leader there is no telling where it might have skyrocketed. The President is, however, learning a hug job on the job. At this point I have him graded a solid C and he is working on a B- in my book. I have come to the opinion in my old age that perhaps we should give him another term rather than elect another person who will learn on the job too ... unless the Republicans can bring forth an unknown that has experience ... and that just is not going to happen. President Obama appears to be pro business. Now if he can just decide to put on the big boy pants of being President of the United States and stop doing a black impression of Jimmy Carter, traveling around prefacing every speech with a Mea Cupla on behalf of our country ... and instead project a vision for the future and lead he would get a solid A in my book. I am keeping my figures crossed but not holding my breath.

Call Prater & Associates For An Appointment Today To Review Your Legal Matter(s)

770-253-7778

Washington Post Link:  Report gives stimulus package high marks

Peachtree City Legal News

Oral contracts can be upheld even for large sums of money: $281M verdict upheld against Turner - Atlanta Business Chronicle:

DEBT COLLECTION| The Old English System

HERE IS A LINK to the FTC site on what is lawful: FTC LINK

In Merry Old England once could spend an entire life in Debtors Prison [mercifully not very long thanks to the poor food and hygiene]. Who founded the United States but the English and interestingly they brought over a lot of bad Pavlovian beliefs, like hounding debtors to death. One of the most famous was Samuel Chase one of the first Justices of the United States Supreme Court who it is said died in a flop house in New Orleans after moving from town to town trying to escape his debt collectors. Any student of history will tell you that no one less than Thomas Jefferson himself was hounded by debt collectors and had it been available would have declared bankruptcy. Today we have protections in debt collection and bankruptcy. Almost everyone wants to pay their creditors|very few creditors want to give anyone a break; and of course the irony today is that we as taxpayers have given many creditors huge breaks and even money to stay afloat!

Here is a recent case overview of a Court getting tough with a debt collecting firm: 2010 Court sanction against a debt collection firm

NEWNAN PRATLAW|| 14th amendment essay

The Supreme Court is reviewing a Chicago gun ban statute this term. The case is McDonald v. Chicago. Mr. McDonald, an elderly man, was upset that on 3 different occasions "Utes" came to his home to "visit", would not leave when he asked, demanded that they vacate his property and then stole everything he owned that was valuable. Mr. McDonald decided to purchase a gun to help him persuade the "Utes" the next time they came to visit that they should leave his home without looting it. Mr. McDonald's acts were apparently illegal according to Chicago's handgun ban. Legally, the case poses the prospect of the Supreme Court finally issuing a decision as to the extent of the scope of the 14th amendment and if they take on that topic the case could be one of the most important cases in our lifetime. It is more likely that the Court will just strike down the handgun ban and limit its decision to the specific statute. I posted the link on my blog at HOT LEGAL TOPICS [Click it to go there]. Hope you find the topic relevant enough to follow and keep up with the Court's decision.

MAKES COPIES OF DOCUMENTS THAT WILL BE EVIDENCE...

...when it comes to documents.

Over the past 23 years I have come to appreciate the fact that Judges as a whole do not like being given documents with highlighted passages or handwritten notes beside the part of the document you think is important. Doing that is really close to a demand that the Court become a participant in the blind men and the elephant philosophical exercise about the scope of perception: The Blind Men And The Elephant Fable and they do not like the Socratic Method to the extreme of banality, i.e., rain is rain you cannot assert you do not understand it until someone explains it to you and you "feel" it. What all this means in plain English is: (a) The Judge controls his or her court room and no one else has any right to control it. So make a copy of any document you feel the urge to write on, so your lawyer can present the 'clean' one to the Judge and draw the Judge's attention to the passage you have highlighted in your 'dirty' copy by asking the Court's permission to draw its attention to that passage; (b) A testifier's inability to grasp easy questions and evasive answers soon turns a Judge off [and a Jury Too]. Do not engage in Tabula Rasa Socratic Responses [inane question answers to straightforward questions], and; always remember: Neither Judge nor Jury need to be hit over the head with information they can clearly see or hear. They really can be trusted to figure it out.

2010 BIG CHANGES FOR THE GOOD

R. KEITH PRATER, P.C. will change its name over the course of 2010 to PRATER & ASSOCIATES as Attorney John D. Duncan has associated with the Firm. Keith Prater is excited about the prospect of mentoring John in the beginning of his practice. John has worked hard to gain his law license and has since associating with the Firm proven himself more than capable, winning outright his first trial, a difficult modification of child support and medical payments case, and obtaining a Not Guilty verdict in his second trial in a misdemeanor case. John's association will allow the firm to handle all the calls coming in from prospective clients many of which were not being returned as the firm's practice grew so large over the past two years that on multiple occasions new prospective client calls were not returned because workload and returning existing client calls consumed the entire workday. We have since John cam on board in October been promptly returning calls more than 95% of the time.

CONTACT R K PRATER TODAY

CONTACT ME FOR AN APPOINTMENT BY CALLING 770-253-7778 OR BY GOING TO MY WEBSITE AND EMAILING ME VIA THE EMAIL FORM FOUND THERE.

IF YOU CALL ME AND WE DON'T HIT IT OFF I WILL ...

REFER YOU TO ANOTHER GREAT LOCAL LAWYER OR TWO OR THREE TO CHOOSE FROM. THERE IS NO ONE GREAT WIZARD OF OZ LAWYER HERE OR ANYWHERE BUT THERE ARE A NUMBER OF REALLY GREAT ONES AROUND HERE ||||

WITH THAT OUT OF THE WAY, here is a repost with solid logic for you to consider:

First: always consult face to face with an attorney regarding any matter that is serious to you.

Second: The ancient mathmatical logic mandate is alive and well today: "All things being equal the simplest answer is the correct answer". This is the anglicization of the latin maxim attributed to the mathematician Ockham, called "Ockham or Occam's Razor": Entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem or "Entities should not be multiplied unnecessarily."

Third: The 'Devil Is In The Details', always was, and always will be. || The hard decision is deciding when all things are in fact equal and what the things are that are equal. That is where experienced legal counsel comes in ~

Fourth: Experience is not just a linear time continuim but also requires/mandates actual real involvement in significant disputes and litigation; a lawyer could, after all, get his/her license, go to sleep like Rumpelstiltskin, wake up 50 years later and parade around proclaiming "Come see me!! I am a Lawyer with 50 years experience" ~ of course the experience would be that he or she had been asleep at the wheel for the past 50 years! Unfortunately some lawyers proclaim just about that.

Fifth: Experience is a great teacher - being asleep at the wheel not so much. Hire a great lawyer with real life experience and a lot of it.

A FEW THOUGHTS FOR CHRISTMAS TIME

Rambling thoughts at Christmas Time: Children are egocentric and get more so the older they age. Do not transpose your beliefs in how you think they should see divorce. Remember they get 2 Christmases. They will wonder if the divorce was their fault and need to be told it was not ~ once. Like horses and pets, Children not only learn from our words, but our tone, cues, gestures, etcetera. The phrase 'grown children' is an oxymoron: after age 18 human beings in the United States are as a matter of law no longer children but citizens, sons and daughters ~ and childhood is but memory. Make your memories fond. Don't qualify to go on the Jerry Springer Show. Here's Wishing You Nothing but The Best! Godspeed you in your life's journey, may you Live Well, Love Truly and Prosper From Your Endeavors!

A GREAT NEWNAN LAWYER

If you are about to go through a divorce, custody dispute, or support modification you want to make sure that you are represented by a great lawyer. How can you make sure that you get everything you want and that the divorce is clean and final if you don’t have good and real legal representation? A divorce lawyer can smooth out the process for you and help you understand the ‘fine print’ of divorce proceedings. You are going to want to work with one of the top divorce lawyers you can find in your area and this article will give you the edge in your search for the divorce lawyer you need to hire. Now don’t take the attitude that you don’t have the money to hire and work with a top divorce lawyer in your area. Though your apprehension is normal, especially since the top divorce lawyers in any area can charge top dollar–way beyond the budget of any ordinary person about to go through a divorce, you need to know that getting on the short list of top divorce lawyers in your area requires a lot of success and that comes from doing a lot of cases not just the million dollar ones. So what makes a top divorce lawyer? Is it the law school he or she attended; the number of high-profile divorces under his or her belt; the cost of legal fees being charged? While these are usual considerations in making that determination, there are others. Top divorce lawyers don’t soar to the top just because they are hired by famous people or because they charge a lot to represent you; they get to the top by hard work hard and by building a good reputation with the Courts as lawyers that are fair and negotiate cases well and when in front of the Court are there for serious business and not for minor details or ridiculous assertions. You will know that you are working with one of the top divorce lawyers when you witness for yourself the lawyer’s level of professionalism. He or she will know the ins and outs of divorce and family law, and the lawyer will take a keen interest in every detail of your case and offer you some words of wisdom based on his or her experience from years before the Court your case is in. He or she will also stay on top of developments in divorce law, and will be constantly adding to his or her knowledge by attending divorce and family law seminars. You also know that you’re dealing with a good lawyer if he or she really takes time to talk to you and learn about your case and discuss strategic ways to present the case in the best light for successfully reaching your goals. Keep in mind that the top divorce lawyers are usually in high demand, and secure them immediately. And be forewarned that a top divorce lawyer is not one that requires a huge up front fee but is one that has a large hourly rate. Don't fear that large hourly rate as a top divorce lawyer will bill fairly and frequently won't charge for short calls and short office visits. Call PRATER & ASSOCIATES today to talk to a top lawyer: 770-253-7778