Paralegals and Legal Assistants Aren’t Your Lawyer, but They Are a Lifeline
When you hire a divorce lawyer, you aren’t usually hiring one person, you’re hiring a team. That’s by design, and it’s not meant to be “shortcut” for your lawyer to…
Don’t Play Dirty in Divorce Just Because Your Spouse Does By Braxton Mounteer, Legal Assistant
We’ve all heard some version of this story: the dramatic, knock-down, drag-out divorce. Where every move is a power play and every lawyer is part strategist, part saboteur. If you're…
How to Identify and Avoid Some Common Dirty Tricks in Divorce Cases. By Braxton Mounteer, Legal Assistant
Some spouses will absolutely exploit the legal system to gain an unfair advantage in divorce proceedings. It's crucial to recognize the manipulative tactics your spouse might employ against you—even if…
How to Be a Good Client in Your Utah Divorce Case
Divorce is for most people a very stressful and emotional process. If you are ready to hire a divorce attorney, knowing how to approach working with your attorney can significantly…
A Family Law Attorney 6 Months Out of Law School Works as an Assistant to One of the Top Family Law Attorneys in the Country. Could This New Attorney Handle an Extremely Wealthy Person’s Child Custody Case? Would Her Boss Let Her?
Anything is possible, but it is not likely that a recently licensed lawyer of only 6 months could handle an extremely wealthy person’s child custody case. Extremely wealthy people usually…
Should You Get Divorced? Weighing Your Options in a Difficult Decision By Braxton Mounteer, Legal Assistant
The decisions to marry and to end a marriage are not decisions to be taken lightly. If divorce is ever an easy choice, something is terribly wrong. Wrong with the…
The Risk and Costs of Asking for a Deadline Extension in Your Divorce By Braxton Mounteer, Legal Assistant
If (or when) you find yourself in the midst of a divorce, you will likely feel like you're caught in a whirlwind of different forces pushing and pulling on you.…
How to Tell Your Kids About Divorce: A Unified Approach By Braxton Mounteer, Legal Assistant
Divorce is hard enough on spouses, but perhaps the most painful impact is on their children. The last thing you should do is create confusion, fear, and emotional scars in…
Divorce Is Too Often Like A Knife Fight By Braxton Mounteer, Legal Assistant
Why is divorce so often like a knife fight? Not a literal one, of course, but a figurative battle where the first move can have lasting—often devastating—consequences. Have you ever…
How Do I Know If My Custody Evaluator and Custody Evaluation Are Any Good? By Braxton Mounteer, Legal Assistant
In your divorce case, you, your spouse (or other parent) and your children may be required to undergo a custody evaluation. The custody evaluation is governed by Utah Code of Judicial Administration Rule…
Your divorce Case Deadlines Will Not Wait By Braxton Mounteer, Legal Assistant.
Divorce is one of the most difficult things that someone can experience. Many in the field of psychology rank divorce just behind a spouse’s death on lists of the most…
How Much Can You Stretch The Truth In Your Testimony? By Braxton Mounteer, Legal Assistant
Many people believe that everyone bends the truth from time to time. While the typical “no, that dress does not make you look fat” white lie in your everyday interactions…
Is Trial In Your Utah Divorce Case a Boxing Match or an Audition? By Braxton Mounteer
Everyone has seen a trial portrayed in a movie or video. An actual trial (especially in a divorce case) is not like television or movies would have you believe. Initially,…
Should You Use Utah’s Court-created Forms? By Braxton Mounteer, Legal Assistant
The Utah courts have created a sizeable library of forms; a few that everyone is required to use, and a lot that can be used--optional, in other words--if one wants.…
Dividing Personal Property In Your Divorce Is Not As Hard As It Seems By Braxton Mounteer, Legal Assistant
During the course of a marriage, you will accumulate marital property, and during your divorce, you will need to divide those items. You may be tempted to bicker over every…
How to Fill Out Your Financial Declaration, Paragraph 6. By Braxton Mounteer, Legal Assistant
Paragraph 6 of your financial declaration addresses your after-tax income. Your after-tax income is a simple calculation. Take your gross monthly income (calculated in paragraph 4) and subtract your monthly…
How to Fill Out Your Financial Declaration, Paragraph Five. By Braxton Mounteer, Legal Assistant
Paragraph five of your financial declaration is about the amount of taxes on your monthly income that you pay per month (or what the average monthly deduction from your income…
How to Fill Out Your Financial Declaration, Paragraph One. By Braxton Mounteer, Legal Assistant
If you find yourself involved in a Utah divorce action (whether child support will be an issue or not) or an action over the support of minor children in Utah…
Taking Your Divorce Case to Trial Requires Just as Much from You as It Does of Your Lawyer, By Braxton Mounteer, Legal Assistant
Taking your divorce case to trial is almost always a long, complicated, and emotionally exhausting process. You may be tempted to believe you can leave all of the work to…
Are You Fighting for Your Kids or Are You Protecting Your Financial Future? By Braxton Mounteer, Legal Assistant
An accusation that gets thrown around a lot in a divorce action is that a parent doesn’t actually want to spend time with his or her children. Usually it's an…
What Would I Have Done Differently If I Were In My Parents’ Shoes? By Braxton Mounteer, Legal Assistant
Like many people, I am a child of divorce. While I may not understand every reason why my parents chose to end their marriage (I was too young to understand…
Why All Communications with Your Former Spouse Should be in Writing By Braxton Mounteer, Legal Assistant.
Even if you trust your former spouse to deal with you honestly and in good faith in any matter pertaining to your divorce, why should you communicate in writing with…
Your Divorce Lawyer is Serious About Deadlines By Braxton Mounteer, Legal Assistant
Throughout the divorce process you will have to meet many deadlines. The court will even provide you with a list of due dates known as a notice of event due…
Should You Stay Friends with Your Former Spouse? By Braxton Mounteer
Whether you should be or try to be friends with your spouse after a divorce is a tough question to answer. Many divorced people continue to care about each other…
Will Having a Child Will Possibly Save Your Marriage? By Braxton Mounteer, Legal Assistant
Have you ever heard that having a child will fix certain problems in marriage? That it will help bring a couple in a strained marriage closer together and thus fix,…
Why Your Witness May Not Be As Good As You Think By Braxton Mounteer
I recently went to trial with my boss for a divorce case. One of the things that stuck out to me was that quite often the witnesses people call in…
You Reap What You Sow.
I’m Braxton Mounteer, a legal assistant. I've written and talked about this problem before, but it's a recurring problem and a serious one. It's hard enough to muster the courage…
You Can’t Tell What The Judge Is Thinking By Braxton Mounteer, Legal Assistant
I recently accompanied my boss to the trial of a divorce case. If I had had to place a bet on what the judge was thinking at given moment or…
Fair Treatment in Court by Braxton Mounteer, Legal Assistant.
The family law legal system likes to portray itself as a shining beacon of justice and equity, but I have seen first-hand that it is not. Whether it is opportunistic…
Is Court-Ordered Therapy Over-Used? By Braxton Mounteer, legal assistant.
Whether you believe that everyone needs (or could benefit from) therapy or that it is only for the most dysfunctional families, you, like most people, likely agree some therapy has…
Should You Ask for a Psychological Evaluation in Your Divorce Case? By Braxton Mounteer
The point of a psychological evaluation isn’t to establish if someone merely suffers from any mental or emotional disorder or disorders, but to help determine whether such disorders, if they…
Why Hiding or Misrepresenting Your Income in a Divorce and/or Child Support Court Case Won’t Work (and why people still try) By Braxton Mounteer
When those who realize they may be ordered to pay child and/or spousal support (alimony) confront the matter, many try to lie about and to misrepresent their income in the hope…
Parenting before, during, and divorce litigation By Braxton Mounteer, Legal Assistant
Divorce is already hard enough on the parties involved, but it is even harder on the children of the recently separated family. I speak as a child of divorce, who…
How to prepare for a consultation with a lawyer By Braxton Mounteer, legal assistant
You have just been served with a summons and complaint (or petition) for divorce. Now have to traverse the minefield that is finding a good divorce attorney. It's harder to find a…
How To Talk To Your Former Spouse By Braxton Mounteer
Regardless of your feelings towards your ex-spouse, if you have children, you will have to talk or otherwise communicate to your ex (and do so often) about the minor children…
Why You Should Always Order Audio Recordings By Braxton Mounteer
You may be asking yourself, why should I order from the court a copy of the audio recordings of my court hearings? Shouldn’t the court's own notes in the written…
Client Red Flags By Braxton Mounteer
In my time as a legal assistant in the family law profession, I have observed many different kinds of client behaviors, some better than others. Those behaviors that cause the…
Evidence and Honesty By Braxton Mounteer
You have just decided to file for divorce. Or perhaps you have been served with divorce papers. At some point early on in the process you will likely think to…
Evidence and Honesty By Braxton Mounteer
You have just decided to file for divorce. Or perhaps you have been served with divorce papers. At some point early on in the process you will likely think to…
Divorce and Identity, by Braxton Mounteer.
Divorce is corrosive. What it does not destroy it almost always affects adversely whatever it touches. The things that survive divorce’s initial devastation are forever changed. This effect is seen…
Lawyers and Deadlines. By Braxton Mounteer
You have just received an email from your lawyer about a deadline that your lawyer needs your help to meet. What should you do? You are already extremely busy with your life and…
Completeness of Documentation By Braxton Mounteer
One of the hardest documents for a Utah divorce litigant to prepare is the financial declaration. I am amazed at the number of clients who don't take this document and…
What Does a Legal Assistant Think of Going Pro Se? By Braxton Mounteer
The term for representing yourself in court is "pro se" or "pro per". Can you navigate the legal system successfully without a lawyer representing you in your case? Before I…
Important things divorce attorney clients need to know but would easily and freely be forgiven for not knowing without being told. No. 2:
If your attorney calls you, it’s important. Take the call, and if you can’t take the call, then call back ASAP (meaning same day, and not at 4:47 p.m.). Hours…
Why Your Lawyer Might Drop Your Case By Braxton Mounteer
So, you have gotten news that your attorney has quit. Your attorney wrote you an email informing you that he or she your counsel either will soon withdraw as your counsel…
How to Avoid Being Called a Liar in a Utah Case By Braxton Mounteer
Who would you believe more in a court case: a person who admits to his/her faults, who honestly discloses all of his/her relevant information (even the information that hurts his/her…
The Importance of Working With Your Lawyer By Braxton Mounteer
I have noticed three chronic problems with clients in just the few weeks I have been working as a legal assistant. 1) Most clients seem to have an almost allergic…
How Creative Writing and Legal Writing are Connected By Braxton Mounteer
How one writes in the legal world and how one writes in the world of creative are both very similar and very different. When I became a legal assistant, I thought…
A Changed Perspective on Justice as a New Legal Assistant By Braxton Mounteer
After working in civil law for a short time (specifically, in divorce and family law), I think that many people have the wrong idea about justice and the court system.…
Court Proceedings from the Perspective of a New Legal Assistant By Braxton Mounteer
I have finished my first week as a legal assistant. In that time, I have been to a few court proceedings. Previous to taking this job as a legal assistant,…