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Legal Aid Ontario and Family Law – Their Role

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  • #16
    I sure wish I knew how to quote! I will try to answer your questions Tayken.

    I was amicable with access. When the decision was made for me to leave it was agreed BETWEEN the parties that I would be moving from the town we resided in with our children. This was a personal decision between the both of us I don't need to elaborate on it; had I remained where I was the father would not have been able to share 50/50 access unless he changed his employment which he was unwilling to do.

    Yes, I was the respondent.

    We hired our separate lawyers to draft an agreement because this was SUPPOSED to be an amicable separation. Wouldn't you know it, we ended up hiring from the same law firm (so much for conflict of interest searches). We met with the lawyers together and hashed out an informal plan so I could move. I continued with THAT laywer and he released his laywer with the intent that my lawyer would draft the agreement and he would then seek independent legal advice when the agreement was in final draft.

    I moved, with the ex's blessing, but this put the children and I into a different district. He eventually retained a lawyer who contacted my laywer and demanded she recuse herself from the file due to the conflict issue. Once that had been done we were back to square one.

    The ex's lawyer DID NOT EVER make any contact with me. I just got served on that cold and frosty morning. I immediately went to legal aid ( knew it was going to be messy from what was in the application), was approved and was waiting for an appointment with the lawyer. The application was given to the lawyer.

    My ex took the children for a weekend. He did not return the children as planned. I was served a 'courtesy copy' of an ex-parte motion that was to be heard that morning several hours away from where I live. So please, please do not tell me about offers MUST be served. Lawyers work around the system all the time. And THAT was the only contact I had ever received from HIS lawyer.

    It took a few months of wrangling my way through the court system but yes, I did get the children back into my care. Once they were back in my care the ex fired his lawyer and it took him several months to get another one so we could settle the remaining issues. This has never gone to trial - the custody was determined through motion and the ex opted to not appeal so that interim custody has remained.

    And to date we have dealt with my lawyer leaving to find better pastures, a new lawyer getting up to speed on both our parts and essentially at the same point we were at in the beginning. Four years later though and he is unable to buy me out so the case drags on and on and on.

    As crazy at it sounds, the ex and I are on amicable terms. We get together frequently for the sake of the kids. We have our moments of disagreement but we agree to disagree. Because we are on such good speaking terms we have had the chance to speak about what happened and I do believe from his conversations that his lawyer was acting unethically. It is the ex's position that his lawyer guaranteed he would get full custody (and this certainly could have gone that way) but he (the lawyer) wasn't seeing the forest for the trees and didn't get the full story - so while I was railroaded at the beginning, the lawyer had a fight on his hands to maintain the staus quo when it went to motion. It was kinda funny to watch in the court room actually.

    No, the lawyer has not sought to have the costs paid. It is in the agreement when and IF he can refinance and this is fine with legal aid - they will get paid first! So please don't accuse me of my story adding up.
    What I find funny is your position that my lawyer needs to bring this forward costing the courts MORE money, especially when I am on legal aid, when we are TRYING profusely to avoid that.

    It really was a family matter that went awry with the involvement of the courts. And yes I did fight for my children. I had to fight - the ex took them away, which was not what we had AGREED on. Do not tell me my story does not add up. And yes, the father is their Dad and they love him very much and spends a lot of time with them which I actively encourage. My children are my life. I do believe that even when we were together I would say 'my kids'.

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