Can defendant in Small-Claims court charge for ''time spent preparing for trial''??

waamo

Fosterdog wrote: »

Why can't you keep all of this to one topic? It's getting to the stage of spamming now.

Agreed. Stick to one thread it makes life easier for those helping. You really don't want to make life difficult as people will give up.

For the record it's useless. If you want something considered it has to be a written statement. You can't just rock up with a verbal statement. That's an ambush and won't be allowed.

October868

SaucySecrets wrote: »

As Waamo says, you don't want to push this unless you want the case referred to the High Court, where you'll incur a lot more costs. She isn't claiming for libel - she's claiming for loss of earnings from your libellous statements. There is a legal difference. If she won't be able to prove that you've made libellous statements, this probably isn't anything to worry about. If she might, it might be. Hopefully the solicitor you spoke to gave you an idea of whether this bit was likely to succeed?

Hello the solicitor didn't comment on the specifics of the claim/my potential defences.

Ultimately though I never public mentioned the defendant's name in any post or comment.
I simply stated that ''I had been scammed out of money by an individual who worked in a certain sector of the industry''.

The only mention of her name was in private conversations between myself and people whom I knew, and I simply told those people the true facts about what she had done.
Many of those individuals already knew about what she had done, since the money which she ran away with was money which was designated to be paid to those other individuals.

None of those people 'employed her' though, merely loosely knew about her, and so none of those people would ever of 'paid her money'.

da_rule

SaucySecrets wrote: »

As Waamo says, you don't want to push this unless you want the case referred to the High Court, where you'll incur a lot more costs. She isn't claiming for libel - she's claiming for loss of earnings from your libellous statements. There is a legal difference. If she won't be able to prove that you've made libellous statements, this probably isn't anything to worry about. If she might, it might be. Hopefully the solicitor you spoke to gave you an idea of whether this bit was likely to succeed?

Unfortunately this argument is flawed. The County Court has no jurisdiction to determine whether a statement is defamatory (unless the parties agree to invoke s.18 of the County Courts Act 1984). Therefore it cannot asses damages flowing from a potentially defamatory statement.

It is also incorrect to say that you cannot claim fixed damages from a defamatory statement. If you can evidence the value of the damage caused by the statement it is perfectly proper to claim for that amount, however this would be in the High Court.

Whether it is sound for the Op to raise the jurisdiction issue is another matter, given that the County Court may use its powers under section 42 of the County Courts Act to transfer all or part of the proceedings to the High Court.

October868

waamo wrote: »

Agreed. Stick to one thread it makes life easier for those helping. You really don't want to make life difficult as people will give up.

For the record it's useless. If you want something considered it has to be a written statement. You can't just rock up with a verbal statement. That's an ambush and won't be allowed.

Hello and I apologise, hopefully the moderators will merge this thread into the previous one.

That isn't designed to be ''submitted'' as a written statement though - I already filed & served my written statements to the court.

This was simply a personal statement for myself, so when the judge asks me to verbally state why I feel I have a good chance of successfully defending the claim, I was going to use that as my personal verbal-aid, to ensure I covered all the points.

da_rule

As Waamo says, you need to be careful what you say in your verbal statement. Evidence in relation to application hearings needs to be presented in writing. Therefore, anything you say needs to be based on what evidence you have previously submitted, you cannot use it to introduce new evidence.

Therefore, your ‘verbal statement’ should just be an abridged version of your written statement. But be sure to be able to point the judge to the relevant pieces of written evidence in relation to each statement you make.

waamo

If it's an aide memoir then keep it a lot snappier. It should just be bullet points to remind you.

You are allowed (but don't have to) submit a skeleton defence to the court. That is a document giving a bullet point outline to your case. Essentially a very trimmed down version of your full defence briefly outlining it.

This can be useful for you (as an aid), the judge who has a sensible overview and the opposition.

October868

Hello and thankyou for your replies.

I will follow your advice and reduce that statement into just 5-6 bullet-points, which I will use as personal verbal-aids when speaking.

#

My understanding is that as the defendant is claiming that apparent Libellous/Defamatory statements made by me were directly the reason why she 'lost potential income', that ultimately she is claiming that I committed Libel | But as the County Court does not have the jurisdiction to consider matters of defamation, a default-judgment cannot stand when 1 of the 2 core basis of it is a matter of defamation.

But so whilst I will mention that as 1 of my reasons why her counterclaim has no merit, I won't dwell on it.

#

I have re-reviewed the defendant's counterclaim & supporting evidence today though (as my emotional state was more settled for a short period), but looking at it, it literally shows absolutely nothing substantive to backup her claims...

She has simply provided 3 screenshots, 2 of them from private conversations between myself & people who I knew personally, and 1 of them a public tweet on my wall..

In none of them is her name even mentioned though.
Instead I simply stated that ''I had fallen victim to being scammed out of money by an individual who appears on a certain TV channel''.
*I also made it clear in the messages even that the TV channel itself had no involvement whatsoever in the matter, and also made it clear in the messages that I wasn't going to dislose the name of the individual.


The theme of the messages was quite simply as general-info warnings to other people about the dangers of sending money to people online, even if the person appears to be 'professional' due to appearing on a TV channel.
But no mention of her name was ever stated by me.
So don't quite understand how merely those 3 screenshots can be used to prove that I was responsible for that certain company not offering her work during a certain period, when her name isn't even mentioned in those messages. :S

October868

*Hello just to update*

I today recieved her 'objection letter' in which she objects to my application to have the default-judgment set-aside.

In the letter she says that her reasons for objecting are-
*My application is based on me saying that I feel I have a good chance of winning, which in her view isn't a good enough/proper reason for a judgment to be set-aside.
*Because the court didn't serve her with a copy of my N244 until 14days after I first posted it to the court.
*Because I, in her view, should of known that I needed to respond to her counterclaim within 14days.
*And because the document supporting my N244 is my 'defence to her counterclaim statement', which I already previously submitted, she claims that because it's not a new document instead is an already filed one that it's invalid.
She also claims that my defence statement apparently doesn't comply with the CPR, although it does.

My instinct is to just simply ignore her objection letter, as she can whinge about whatever she wants to the court, but it's ultimately the judge who granted this application.
Is that the best thing to do though?


Also as 1 of my reasons, which I'm going to state to the judge, of why I feel the default-judgment should be set-aside, is because 1/2 of the defendant's claim is based on alledged defamation matters; but so that part of the claim should automatically be set-aside since the County Court doesn't have the jurisdiction to hear/assess matters of defamation.
But do I need to mention that point before the hearing, or can I just mention it on the day of the N244 hearing?

As ultimately I'm not going to be 'introducing any new evidence' myself by highlighting that point, instead will just be highlighting a point of law, but didn't know if I still have to mention that before the hearing?

waamo

If you want anything brought up at the hearing you have to put it forward first. Remember no hijacks or surprises.

I would ignore her objection statement too.

October868

waamo wrote: »

If you want anything brought up at the hearing you have to put it forward first. Remember no hijacks or surprises.

I would ignore her objection statement too.

Hello and thankyou for your message.

But ok, so I need to write to the court/judge telling them-
''That in addition to the reasons already stated in my N244 form as to why I think the default-judgment should be set-aside, I also wish to include the reason that the defendant's counterclaim is based on alledged defamation, but all claims for defamation must be started in the high court, and in accordance with the rules set by the high court...''

Correct?