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Can I be garnished after a judgment is made against me 5 years ago?
Anonymous7 views3 answers
I was sued by my school for unpaid tuition in Dec 2015. A judgment was granted against me on 2/3/16. It should also be noted that I was never even served papers for this lawsuit, because the papers were served at an old address, where I was no longer living at that time. I wasn’t even aware of any lawsuit until a default judgment was granted against me. I then filed a bankruptcy, but it was dismissed because I accidentally forgot to pay the final installment of my payment plan for filing. However, the school noted my account as closed due to bankruptcy, and it was removed from my credit report years ago.
A few weeks ago I was sued by a different creditor. I paid off my outstanding balance in full with the law office. However, since it was the same law office as the one that sued me for my tuition, they are now trying to come after me for the judgment from 5 years ago. I have at no point in the last 5 years even been contacted about this judgment, now I am suddenly being harassed by the law office for payment.
My question is am I still legally required to pay this after 5 years of no contact and without even being notified about the lawsuit? Is there any other recourse?
Once a judgment is entered against anyone, they only have a limited amount of time to ask that the judgment be set aside. Your claim that you "were not served" is inaccurate, because when you move and fail to notify your creditors of your new address, the court can authorize "substituted service" on you by publishing notice in a local newspaper.
Judgments live a long long time, much longer than a statute of limitation. Hope this perspective helps!
It sounds as if the bankruptcy discharge does not apply, because the bankruptcy was dismissed.
So, then the question becomes how long is the judgment valid (for example, in Calif. a creditor has 10 years to collect) vs. whether you can raise the school's earlier assertion that the debt was cancelled as an ESTOPPEL. I.E., they .told you the debt was cancelled years ago; your argument will be that the law firm, as their agent, is barred by that assertion.
Their response will be that they assumed you would complete the BK, which you did not. But were they really committed to following the BK for 5 years, or just getting the loan off their books?
GOOD LUCK
I suggest you employ an attorney in the State of the Judgment who can advise of that State's laws of Statutes of Limitation. Then also discuss when to file motion to vacate the judgment or write to plaintiff's attorney to voluntarily remove it. Good luck.
