Filing an Answer in Justice Court

The First Judicial District Court Clerk's Office has posted Instructions for Preparing, Filing, Serving an Answer in Justice Court on its page of Justice Court forms.  (There are sample District Court forms as well, although no Answer as of this posting.)

NOTE: This document has been prepared as a courtesy and to assist you with completing your Answer. It is not to be construed as providing legal advice or representation on how to prepare your case or defense.

If you’ve been served with a Summons and complaint in the Justice Court and have been named as a defendant in the case, you have the option of preparing, filing, and serving an Answer in response to the complaint. An Answer is your formal reply to the court and the plaintiff’s attorney (or the plaintiff if he doesn’t have an attorney.) You must reply to each paragraph/allegation in the complaint by admitting it, denying it, or denying it because you don’t have enough knowledge or information to be able to admit it. You only have 20 days from the day you were served with the Summons and complaint to file and serve your Answer. If you don’t file an Answer in the court and serve a copy to the plaintiff’s attorney (or the plaintiff, if he’s unrepresented) within 20 days of the day you were served, then the plaintiff may obtain a default judgment against you.

WARNING: The filing of an Answer affects your legal rights. If you file an Answer, you have agreed that the court in which you file your Answer has good and proper jurisdiction over you to decide your case.

If you are in Reno, there is a sample Answer on the Reno Justice court civil forms page.  In Las Vegas, the Clark County Civil Law Self-Help Center has information on civil actions including what to do if you've been sued, as well as small claims actions. 

Rule Amendments

Don't forget there is a lag between when a rule is adopted/amended/repealed and when it makes it into the print NRS.  There is a new sortable table available on the Supreme Court's website which has links to the Administrative Docket and orders amending court rules.  The table includes the ADKT number, rules affected, links to both the ADKT and order, a short description of the amendment and effective date and each column is sortable.

Attorneys practicing before the Nevada Supreme Court might be interested in the 11/4/11 order on ADKT 467 amending NRAP 3C, 3E, 28.1, 28.2, 32, 40, and 40A and Associated Forms - "Concerns format and length of briefs, fast track statements and responses, and petitions for rehearing and reconsideration" which is effective 1/3/12. 

Westlaw Pop-Up Blocker Fix

If you are having trouble printing Westlaw* documents, odds are the issue is caused by your browser's pop-up blocker. 

For IE, go to Tools | Pop-up Blocker | Pop-up Blocker Settings and type the following into the Address of Website to Allow box:

*.westlaw.com 

then click on Add and then add the three URLs listed below, click on Close and you should be good to go.  

print.westlaw.com
next.westlaw.com
web2.westlaw.com

*Actually this works with any sort of pop-up blocker issue, but we needed to use it for our public access Westlaw computers. 

Law Library Closed in Observance of Veterans' Day

The Supreme Court Library will be closed on Friday, November 11, 2011 in observance of Veterans' Day.  The Library will reopen at 8 a.m. on Monday, November 14.

Residency Requirements

While working on another matter, I recently discovered an interesting document on the Legislative Counsel Bureau Research Division's Publications/Fact Sheets page:  Fact Sheet on Residency Requirements in Nevada.  It includes links to relevant NRS citations.  For example, if one wondered how long s/he needed to live in Nevada to be eligible to vote:

Persons are eligible to vote if, before an election, they have continuously resided in the State and the county for 30 days and in the precinct for 10 days (NRS 293.485). 

Supreme Court Library CLOSED on Friday, July 22, 2011 for furloughs

The Supreme Court Library will be closed on Friday, July 22 for staff furloughs.  The Supreme Court building, including the Clerk's Office, will be open.  The law library will reopen at 8 a.m. on Monday, July 25, 2011. 

We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.

New (Fiscal) Year, New Presumptive Maximum Amounts of Child Support

Back in October of 2010 we blogged about Presumptive Maximum Amounts (PMA) of Child Support.  PMAs are adjusted every year effective July 1, so there is a new document available on the Court's website with the new amounts.

The presumptive maximum amounts for July 1, 2011-June 30, 2012 may be found on the Supreme Court's website under Documents and Forms | Self-Help/Pro Se | Family Division Forms. PMAs back to July 1, 2003 are also available from the court's website.