Aided by the Internet, Self-Help Law Matures

The Pasadena couple had already shelled out thousands of dollars in legal fees and waited more than a year for their family law problem to be resolved. With no relief in sight, the husband powered up his computer to see it he could do a better job himself.

The 50-year-old man wanted to help his wife go after his stepchild’s deadbeat dad for increased child support. There, in his home office, he tapped into a new Web site run by the California state court system: https://www.courtinfo.ca.gov/selfhelp.

In less than two minutes, he found what he needed--including legal information and downloadable forms--for petitioning the government to take action.

“If I had known what I know now, I would have gone straight to [the state court] Web site,” said the man, who asked not to be identified.

The self-help site saved “a few dozen phone calls and hours of library research,” he said.

The Pasadena man is one of a growing number of Californians trying to solve their problems without using lawyers. To assist these do-it-yourselfers, California courts have jumped on the high-tech bandwagon by offering legal information, guidance and forms over the Internet.

Launched in July, the California courts’ online self-help law center is intended to increase court efficiency and make the law more accessible to litigants without attorneys, an estimated 4.3 million people who--with headaches ranging from impending divorces to traffic citations--flooded into California state courts last year.

With more than 900 cyberpages of content so far, the California courts’ Web site offers help on topics ranging from family law to landlord-tenant matters, from personal bankruptcy to wills--and downloadable forms for each procedure. To remind prospective litigants that there are alternatives to going to court, there also is a link titled “You Don’t Have to Sue” that explains the pros and cons of mediation.

Like many of the recent projects of the Judicial Council, the policymaking arm of the California Supreme Court, the new Web site is intended to demystify an institution long regarded as virtually impenetrable, not to mention highly intimidating, for nonlawyers.

“We’re making [courts] more user friendly for the public,” said Chief Justice Ronald M. George of the California Supreme Court, who also has been leading statewide efforts to simplify court forms and modernize the language used in jury instructions. The self-help Web site, George said, may go a long way toward “improving access and fairness in the justice system.”

Though other states--such as Arizona, New Jersey, Utah, Connecticut and Hawaii--have put up self-help legal Web sites, California’s site is one of the most well-organized and comprehensive, said Paula Hannaford, an expert on self-help law at the National Center for State Courts.

Having government get into the business of providing online legal self-help is yet another sign that do-it-yourself law has come of age.

“Thirty years ago, if you wanted to be your own lawyer, it was considered do-it-yourself brain surgery,” said Ralph Warner, a former legal aid lawyer and co-founder of Nolo, a Berkeley-based company that publishes self-help legal books and software. “It’s finally going mainstream after all these years.”

But seeking help online can still be perilous for the lawyerless litigant. With anyone able to start a Web site, legal information and forms floating in cyberspace can be outdated, misleading or flat-out wrong.

When it comes to doing legal research and finding the right forms online, “there’s is a good deal of caveat emptor involved,” or let the buyer beware, said Will Hornsby, staff counsel for the American Bar Assn.

Do-it-yourself litigants should make sure the site is run by a trustworthy source--such as reputable lawyers, well-known publishing houses or government agencies--experts say. It is also important to ascertain that the information and forms have not been superseded by new laws or court rulings.

“Does the site have an unspoken political or moral agenda? If so, its advice may be tainted,” said Robert J. Ambrogi, author of “The Essential Guide to the Best (and Worst) Legal Sites on the Web” and editor-in-chief of the National Law Journal.

Experts point to https://www.Nolo.com, https://www.FindLaw.com and https://www.DivorceNet.com as among the best and most comprehensive privately run Web sites that offer legal self-help.

For Californians, the information and forms posted on the Judicial Council’s Web site have the added advantage of bearing an implicit stamp of approval from the state court system.

But the state Web site’s offerings do not include some niche legal areas, such as comprehensive information on do-it-yourself patenting or forming your own limited liability corporation. The site mainly focuses on those areas of law that would help the greatest number of lawyerless litigants who are flooding into the court system.

Stephanie Hall, a 24-year-old Laguna Niguel technical support specialist, is the kind of person the Judicial Council’s Web site was designed to help. She had a small-claims dispute over car repairs, and she found all the information she needed for filing a complaint from the site.

“It was fairly easy to use and it was loaded with information,” Hall said, adding that the fact that the information came from a government entity made her trust it more than others.

Do-it-yourself law has its share of critics who say most people with legal problems--other than small-claims litigants, who as a matter of law cannot be represented by a lawyer--are probably better served by a lawyer.

“I don’t think the average person is in a position to really find definite answers for themselves on the Web,” said Carol Cooper, publisher of Martindale-Hubbell, a nationwide directory of law firms and lawyers that includes https://www.Lawyers.com. Litigants without lawyers, Cooper said, may “fail to anticipate some of their legal needs from a planning point of view.”

But others dismiss those concerns, saying that simple legal problems usually do not require professional help. “Not everything needs to be litigated to the fullest, with full discovery and services of an attorney,” said Tom Gordon, associate counsel of HALT--An Organization of Americans for Legal Reform.

In the case of the Pasadena couple with the family law problem, it’s too soon to tell whether their self-help efforts will pay off. But the husband said he is hopeful.

Sites such as that of the Judicial Council, he said, are “a way of keeping myself fully informed and my attorney honest.”