There Are Some Alternatives To Actually Going To Court, And There Are Some That Are Interwoven Into With Court And Alternative Means Simultaneously.
Video Transcribed: Does getting a divorce always require trials and a lot of adversarial conduct in court? It doesn’t. That’s kind of the answer there. My name is Ryan Cannonie, I am the Tahlequah criminal defense attorney for Wirth Law Office in Cherokee County.
One thing that most people think of when they think of courts, they think of judges and attorneys battling it out and witnesses on the stand.
You can’t handle the truth lies, being able to prove people are lying or whatnot, but they don’t always think about the alternatives to court.
There are some alternatives to actually going to court, and there are some that are interwoven into with court and alternative means simultaneously.
One of those that you can do either as an early settlement or you can do as a court ordered, it’s called mediation.
Now, a mediation, you are sent to someone who is a licensed certified mediator, and you can, and probably should, have an attorney with you, but instead of your attorney attacking the other person, or challenging their evidence, or anything like that, or their statements, the attorney there is just to consult you during the mediation.
Now, a mediation is not always successful, but it can help when there are minor disagreements between the parties that just need to be ironed out, to have a neutral third party there as a go between to see if they can work as a compromise.
And if you can, then the compromise is usually put down into some type of writing. It’s in plain English. You can take that back to the court if it’s court ordered as part of trying to avoid going into a trial, the mediator will submit a report to the court, and then, you can get your divorce settled that way.
That’s that’s one option. Now, having an attorney during this process is good because the mediator is not on either side. The mediator’s there to try to assist with the dialogue and the forming of a compromise. The other person’s clearly not on your side.
So, having an attorney on your side can explain how certain aspects like, maybe you’re talking about how division of assets is going to work. Different things like that, an attorney can walk you through.
While the mediator is trying to find a compromise, the attorney is there to protect your interest, not just the agreement.
The attorney is also there to counsel you when the mediator suggests something about how it’s going to impact you in your case and whether or not this is in your best interest or if it’s better to proceed with the court process.
So, mediation’s a good tool to have, but even if you go through mediation, it’s important to still be able to have an attorney there riding shotgun to be able to help you navigate that process.
If you were thinking about mediation or if you have more questions about it, contact a Tahlequah family attorney. We can look over your situation and make some recommendations to you.
