The Sex and Colour of Justice

It is with varying degrees of mixed feelings, namely cold comfort and lukewarm satisfaction, that I can claim that over fifteen years of legal and illegal persecution, I was never bettered by a single lawyer in a court of law. However, even having won every single case against me, in something like fifty trials, I still came out of it all in ruins. In short, I managed to seize defeat from the jaws of victory.

My troubles all began when my second crazy, vindictive second ex-wife went completely off the rails and set out to destroy me. In many ways she succeeded, but in the end, I came out of it ok. Yes it totally ruined me economically and damaged my health more than enough to ensure a much shorter lifespan. But for now, I am here with enough spark left in me to tell the tale.

A very big part of the problem was an over sympathetic, highly biased judge and an army of corrupt lawyers who for obvious reasons I cannot actually name. More's the pity since this gives these guys carte blanch to continue causing an awful lot of damage to innocent people.

The first lawyer I came across turned out to be an ex boyfriend of my sister-in-law. The second one was an old sailing buddy of my ex's uncle. The third one told me a pack of lies, like that he spoke very good English, which was a nonsense, and that my divorce had to be in two parts. He told me that such was the size of our joint assets, they would have to be dealt with in a city with greater powers. Absolute bullshit.

To make matters worse, after we completed the first part of the divorce and I asked when could we begin the second part in that other city, he claimed that there was no second part and that he had never said that there would be!

Fortunately, I had only paid him a small deposit of 100 dollars. When he asked when I could pay him the rest, about 700 dollars, I told him I would pay it when he completed the divorce. I never heard from him again, and nor did he ever again hear from me.

And so we come to the really bad guys. The first of these three musketeers I shall call Frank. Now this was a man who was incredibly well dressed and very formal in his manner. To get some measure of the man I asked him if he believed in God. "Yes sir, I most certainly do," he replied with too much emphasis for my liking. The one thing I did like about Frank was he came across as exceptionally methodical and very well organised. In a word, Frank was the consummate professional. 'Tis a pity that he also turned out to be a consummate chest beating Christ worshipping crook.

In a somewhat less significant case, the courts designated another lawyer from out of town. Jesus was a good man to the bone, I just got that feeling from the very moment I met him.

Jesus knew that I had Frank representing me on a much bigger case and warned me to be very careful with him. Jesus told me about a client of Frank who was lying in his deathbed with Frank dealing with his last will and testament. Frank persuaded the dying man to leave his entire estate to him, managing to dupe the man's family out every last cent of their inheritance. Needless to say, it didn't take long for Frank to show his true colours almost to my cost. I say almost since I was already up to speed with his ways, thanks to Jesus, and able to avert a disaster.

Frank won my case with a lot of diligent research, digging out a very old but still significant legal precedent, and the court awarded me almost forty thousand dollars against my ex wife. After giving me the good news, Frank then dropped a bombshell on me.

Frank had been appointed as a Pro Bono lawyer. The lawyer gets paid a flat rate of about 150 dollars by the state for those people who are unable to afford legal representation. However, Frank had a more beneficial idea in mind.

After my court case win, unbeknownst to me and without my agreement, Frank had changed my status from Pro Bono to private client. He then calculated the time he had spent on the case and came up with a figure of ten thousand dollars, which he said would have to be paid by my ex wife. What's more he told me that since my wife had to pay my award to him, he was entitled to take his ten grand from that money. Fortunately not only was I forewarned, but I had, and still have, an excellent friend, Salvador, who is also a very successful lawyer. Salvador told me it was all bullshit. Any money Frank got from my ex, to be passed on to me, was to be paid to me in full. If she owed him ten grand then he would have to get it off her separately.

Frank was duly reported to the law society, who sacked him off my case, and gave me a new solicitor. In the end, all crooked Frank got was 150 dollars. Oh dear, how sad, never mind eh Frank, you crook.

The next crook I crossed swords with, a guy I shall call Ray, was as slimy as they come. At this point I have to say that my ex seemed to be something of an expert at finding the slimiest lawyers in town. This one clearly fancied himself as some sort of latter day Perry Mason cum moustachioed Wild Bill Hickock.

One day, right out of the blue, came up to me in a coffee bar and offered to buy me a coffee. He pretended to be no more than a friendly local. Ray asked me lots of questions, which made me suspicious, like what are you doing here in Spain, what do you do for a living, is it well paid.......? I told him the truth, which was nothing to write home about. After about fifteen minutes of this interrogation, masquerading as friendliness, Ray left, and I saw no more of him until about a year later. Right up until my next encounter with Ray, I had not the slightest idea exactly who he was.

A year down the line, upon entering a court admin office I immediately saw Ray and recognised him as that friendly local. When I asked the legal secretary who he was, she said, "Oh him, he's your ex wife's lawyer. Why?" I said nothing.

This dirtbag caused me so many problems, including the loss of a very good business, a language academy, and in the pursuit of money, my ex claimed she was owed, but wasn't.

I sat in a narrow passage way in the court building when this clown marched down the passage, and stopped right next to me. He clicked his heels and shot his cuffs as he looked down into the depths of a ring bound file of papers, and started to tut disapprovingly. His behaviour shouted out loud. " Oh dear, look what I have got on you here boyo. You are in deep, deep shit." Then he closed the folder and carried on his way to the room at the end of the passageway. I was unimpressed and just wanted to laugh out loud at his shallow amateur theatrics.

In the judge's office I was interrogated by the judge in the presence of a secretary, a translator, and the wannabe Perry Mason. It was all routine stuff until right at the end the judge asked the clown if he had any more questions. Clearly he wasn't finished with his hamming it up. He said yes, that he had one more very important question, then he went deadly silent for a full two minutes. He started to circle me like a hawk as I sat with bated breath for the killer question to emanate from the lips of the class clown. The judge grew inpatient and told him if he had a question he had better get on with it.

Ray stopped to the left of me, closer than he needed to be, and looking down at me again clicked his heels and shot his cuffs. "Do you not think,...." he opined, "....that morally you really ought to pay your ex wife this money?" The question was supposed to hit me like a bullet from a gun on the draw. For me it was a blank.

By this time I had had enough of this idiot. The judge asked the translator to translate the question and I told the judge, that there was no need, I understood every single word.

"Ok big shot....," I said fluently . " Listen to me very, very carefully mister. First of all, your shit theatrics do not impress me, so you can quit that total and utter bullshit nonsense. Secondly I do not owe your client a cent. On the contrary, she owes me forty thousand dollars. As for morality, do you not think it highly immoral to illegally interrogate somebody in a public bar over a so called friendly coffee? Immoral and unethical I would say. I will of course be launching legal proceedings against you tomorrow morning. I have got nothing more to say."

The judge looked at me in horror. The stenographer whose job it was to type everything, looked at the judge and asked, "Am I to type that little exchange?"

The judge shook her head as she said, "No, type nothing of the sort. Ignore it, every word." Then she turned to Ray and said "Ray, I'm sorry that is not a question this gentleman is obliged to answer. We are not here to investigate morality." Then she turned to me and said sympathetically, "Thank you Mr North, you can go." Sadly, I had to tangle with this vicious fool a few times more yet, tho I am happy to report that he never got the better of me, at least not in court. And much further down the line, I did get the opportunity to play him at his own theatrical games. Being a far better actor than Ray, I did at least have the pleasure of seeing him very painfully squirm in front of his new date and ruin his weekend if not the rest of his miserable life.