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Hi everyone, I’m Dr. Michael Mantell. Welcome to another Family Law Matters. I’m privileged to be joining Bonnie Rabinovitch Mantel, who is the owner and managing partner of the Primus Family Law Group, a family-oriented firm where experience meets results.
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Hi Bonnie. Hi Michael, how are you doing today? I’m doing well, thank you very much. How are you doing? I am doing very well.
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Another day in San Diego? Here we are, right? Right. I suspect that you’re doing better than those who think in the midst of this crazy broken legal system, especially in family law, that they can go in without an attorney and they can just handle their cases and judges who make up these decisions and they’re left, in a sense, defenseless. Talk about that a little bit.
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What’s your experience with people who think, I can handle myself in court, I don’t need an attorney? Michael, when I tell people that, it always sounds like I’m talking TV, that I wanna get your money. Talk about the reality of our system. Every three years, our judges get assigned out and new ones come in.
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And if anybody out there thinks that all of our family law judges have family law experience, they don’t. A lot of them come from criminal backgrounds. A lot of them come from civil backgrounds.
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They must cut their teeth somewhere. And it seems like somebody came up with a wonderful idea that these new judges should cut their teeth on family law when you know you’re dealing with people’s lives and their children and their financial futures. And so we are left with, look, and they do get trained, Michael.
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I’m not gonna say that they, and they shadow other judges, but they don’t have any family law experience, a lot of them. And when you go in yourself and you have no family law experience, and then you’re faced with a judge who has no family law experience, I see problems. And sometimes wrong orders are made, things are misunderstood.
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It’s an interesting field in that way, Michael, because we have a lot of forms. It seems like it’s easy, ah, check a box. But if you don’t do it right, you set up so many domino mistakes.
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You know, I imagine that for some people who think I’m gonna save money by not having an attorney, and this is a tricky topic, because it does sound like we’re selling, go get a lawyer, but we’re not. Because ultimately, without a lawyer, going in without a lawyer can wind up costing you more afterwards when you finally need an attorney to step in and fix what you couldn’t because you weren’t sophisticated enough to catch it all. So if people have questions about this and they wanna talk with you, I know you offer a free 30-minute consultation.
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How can they take advantage of that? Well, they can reach us directly at 619-574-8000, and you’ll be put on one of our amazing Certified Family Law Specialist calendar for that free 30-minute telephone or Zoom, whichever you prefer, consultation. Or you can reach us online, Michael, www.primusfamilylaw.com. There’s a form you can fill out. There’s a live chat agent.
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They’ll get you over. We look forward to helping.