Louisiana Personal Injury Lawyer Blog
Ever feel like you have been wrongfully brought to court? If so, then what legal remedies do you have at your disposal? In Louisiana, the law provides a person who has wrongly been brought to court with a tort cause of action called abuse of process. A recent Fifth Circuit Louisiana Court of Appeal decision highlights some of the procedural and legal requirements for this lesser known tort.
The alleged “frivolous” lawsuit centers around an eviction lawsuit. Allicen and Kenneth Caluda filed an eviction lawsuit against Fifth Business, LLC (“Fifth Business”). In the lawsuit, the Caludas also added No Drama, LLC (“No Drama”) as a defendant. Nearly seven years after the eviction lawsuit, No Drama filed an abuse of process lawsuit. To prove an abuse of process claim, No Drama needed to prove 1) the Caludas sued No Drama for an improper purpose and 2) the Caludas engaged in improper conduct during the prosecution of the action. See Goldstein v. Serio, 496 So. 2d 412, 415 (La. Ct. App. 1986). No Drama alleged the Caludas improperly filed suit in order to hold the company financially liable for the couple’s lease dispute with Fifth Avenue. It also claimed that the cost of defending the lawsuit, after informing the couple of its independent status, forced it to halt operations. The Caludas’ countered, arguing that No Drama was prescribed from bringing the abuse of process claim because it failed to file the claim within the appropriate time period required by Louisiana law which, for an abuse of process claim, is one year. The trial court agreed with the Caludas, dismissing No Drama’s lawsuit. No Drama appealed the trial court’s ruling.
On appeal, No Drama argued that the prescription period never commenced because the underlying eviction case needed to be decided prior to it bringing the abuse of process lawsuit. No Drama also argued the prescription period was suspended because Caludas was committing a “continuous tort.” A continuous tort is an ongoing unlawful course of conduct that results in uninterrupted injury to the plaintiff. Crump v. Sabine River Auth., 737 So.2d 720, 728 (La. 1999). No Drama alleged the Caludas, by maintaining a wrongful lawsuit and causing ongoing financial injury, committed a continuous tort and therefore, the prescription period was suspended or tolled as a result.
Labor contracts are often tricky and scary because potential employees generally find it difficult to negotiate with employers for terms favorable to them, while employers use standard contracts with terms potential employees don’t understand or aren’t used to seeing, which guarantee the employers a better deal.
Leasing agreements often are complex and lengthy, especially in a commercial context. A common provision contained in most leasing agreements is an indemnity provision. An indemnity provision is a section in a leasing agreement that requires the leasee (the person who leases the property) to take responsibility for certain lawsuits involving the leased property. A recent decision from the Second Circuit Court of Appeal for Louisiana illustrates the power of an indemnity provision.
Buying a home is a complex and stressful process. Not only must a homebuyer make sure he or she has the required funds to purchase the home, but must also thoroughly check that the home is in good condition. Generally, determining the condition of a home is relatively easy. Under the law, a home-seller is obligated to disclose certain defects. Failure to do so can result in a lawsuit. A recent case from the United States Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals illustrates the legal repercussions that can befall a home-seller when he or she withholds certain deficiencies in the condition of the home.
When bringing a personal injury lawsuit a plaintiff must prove that the defendant in the lawsuit caused the injury. Often, when an injury involves two parties, the question of who caused the injury has a relatively straightforward answer. However, problems arise when the circumstances surrounding the injury involve multiple parties. A recent case out of the Louisiana First Circuit Court of Appeal illustrates the complexity of proving who caused an injury when multiple parties are involved.
Life insurance benefits can provide beneficiaries with the monetary needs they require. What is a life insurance policy? An insurance company agrees by contract to provide a lump-sum payment, called a death benefit, to the beneficiaries upon the insured’s death in exchange for premium payments. But what happens when the insured dies and the beneficiary encounter problems in getting paid? This case out of Concordia Parish explains entitlement to life insurance proceeds in Louisiana. 
People have bargained with one another since the dawn of time. Many agreements occur through mere conversation, but memory may be faulty or even denied. Thus, written contracts exist to keep a record of agreements made by two people or business entities. When a disagreement over the meaning of a contract is brought to court, the court will refrain from unnecessarily changing the meaning of words in a contract, opting instead to take the written words literally and simply. 
It’s a common belief that a landlord is always responsible for the upkeep of a property, and if an injury occurs because of the landlord’s failure to keep premises safe the landlord is financially responsible for any injury suffered. As Kwan Anderson learned the difficult way, however, this is not always the case. A lawsuit out of Parish of Evangeline shows that when a tenant contracts to take on responsibilities of upkeep, they could lose their ability to collect damages for an injury caused by that failure of upkeep.
Lawsuits often appear to be complicated and complex, but what many people don’t know is that the outcome of a lawsuit can often be determined by a simple matter of logistics. The who, what, when, where and why of a situation can make the difference between winning and losing a case. For instance, a simple matter of jurisdiction was the deciding factor in a case brought by a South Louisiana man and his wife. 
Wouldn’t it be a disappointment to have your legal claims dismissed because you missed a filing deadline? The rules that apply to time limits for filing cases can be complicated, as Top Dollar Pawn, Gun and Car Audio #5 in Shreveport, Louisiana found when Top Dollar’s lawsuit was dismissed by the trial court because it was filed after the one-year statute of limitations, the allowed period of time to bring a legal claim, had run.