Overcoming the Devastation of Legal Abuse Syndrome [Paperback]

Karin Huffer (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0964178605 | ISBN-13: 978-0964178601 | Publication Date: June 1995

Protracted Litigation can be hazardous to yur health. Legal Abuse Syndrome is an insightful book that offers numerous case studies on the invisible cumulative stressors from dealing with the justice systems. This book can be used as a self-help manual or a guide for legal and health professionals. The methods outlined for dealing with losses and grief during litigation have been found to be sound and meeting the standards of managed care. The victimization felt by the court system is well documented and validates those who have experienced devastation of their belief systems as a result of court involvement. The book offers an eight-step protocol that is effective is assisting litigants preparing for court, during court, and after the court experience. The condition, legal abuse syndrome, is a variant of post traumatic stress disorder and is covered by most insurances as well as qualifying under the Americans with Disabilities Act for accommodations when needed. It works well with Eye Movement Densitization and Reprocessing EMDR therapy.

Editorial Reviews

Review

All courthouse personnel and public interest lawyers who wish to see citizen litigants given the propert opportunities for their day in court will find some background material and answers to help in solving this growing problem through the device of Karin Huffer's treatise, Overcoming the Devastation of Legal Abuse Syndrome. -- Frank Alan Herch, Esq, Director Clark County Law Library

Bankruptcy attorneys can end up with compassion fatigue from watching what their clients are going through. -- Commercial Law Bulletin September/October 1997

Hopefully this book represents the tip of the iceberg of a Dialogue between the courts and those who offer counsel to litigants. -- Frank Herch, Director Clark County Law Library, 1997

Huffer describes how many victims of white-collar crime, court abuse and bureaucratic bungling have come to suffer from posttraumatic stress disorder as a result of having brushed up against various phases of our legal system. -- Alan M.Dershowitz, Professor, Harvard Law School

Huffer has raised a significant issue for strategies for justice system reform. -- Law Librarians (LISP) Newsletter

Karin Huffer's book on Overcoming the Devastation of Legal Abuse Syndrome, published by Fulkort Press, has an ominous subtitle: Warning: Protracted Litigation can be hazardous to your health. This insightful book offers numerous case studies on the invisible cumulative stressors complicating recovery from dealing with the justice system. It can be used as a self-help manual or a textbook for legal and health professionals. The methods outlined for dealing with losses and grief during litigation are sound and meet the standards of managed care. The victimization felt in the court system is well documented and validating to those who have experienced similar devastation of their belief systems. The burdensome duration, economic oppression, misinformation, character assassination and betrayal felt during and after legal proceedings are discussed. As therapists, we try to establish a climate that enable clients to feel empowered by their interactions. The legal system doesn't off the same climate. Karin Huffer is a Las Vegas therapist, specializing in empowering the citizen litigant and assisting her clients in correcting the stress and pain she has identified as Legal Abuse Syndrome. -- Roberta Hartman VanderVoort, MS, MFT President Nevada Chapter American Association of Marriage and Family Therapists

Karin makes a very strong case for civil litigants to feel more empowered. -- John S. McGroarty District Court Judge Eight Judicial District

People find that they have a legal systemn that corporate lawyers play well, but doesn't allow people to obtain justice. -- San Francisco Chronicle Reynolds Holding May 18, 1997

From the Publisher

You're familiar with the look of abject frustration which often paints the faces of litigants. You're also familiar with the clenched teeth, the nervous ramblings, and the occasional blasts of profanity. Thanks to Ms. Huffer, we now have a clinical name for these behaviors. They're symptoms of a larger psychological disorder she has named Legal Abuse Syndrome. If Huffer's research is accurate, citizens who have prolonged and unsuccessful experiences with the courts run the risk of developing a post traumatic stress disorder similar to combat fatigue. To put it bluntly, having to do "battle" with a system whose basic operating procedures are cloaked in arcane language and guarded by the spectre of the Unauthorized Practice of Law can be damaging to your psyche! Her book, Overcoming the Devastation of Legal Abuse Syndrome is a detailed examination of this syndrome and its impact on citizen litigants. It should be in the hands of every therapist, social worker, attorney, judge, and politician in the nation. It mostly belongs in the hands of those who are hurting as a result of a judicial system that does not serve the taxpayer.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 236 pages
• Publisher: Karin Huffer (June 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0964178605
• ISBN-13: 978-0964178601
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.2 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,552,677 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Enlightening. Supportive. Healing, December 21, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Overcoming the Devastation of Legal Abuse Syndrome (Paperback)

Wish I had found this book before my pummeling.
For all the folk who have had their eyeballs peeled for them by the legal system as well as those who are about to dive in.
Empowering. A path back to wholeness. Worth its weight in gold.

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Worth reading, NOLO Press, Ralph Warner, April 9, 1997

By A Customer

This review is from: Overcoming the Devastation of Legal Abuse Syndrome (Paperback)

Anyone who has ever worked ina legal aid office or law library has met people whose lives hvae come unhinged after a bad contact with the legal system. The details vary, they may have lost a business or an inheritance or the custody of a child, but the common them of feeling ripped off or violated by the legal system does not. Even 20 years after losing a lawsuite, some people who suffer from lega abuse synrome still carry a suitcase of old legal papers around, desperately hoping someone will help them find justice. This is the first book to identify what can best be described as a mental illness. It's must reading for anyone who comes in contact with America's small army of "suitcase people."

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Warning: protracted litigation can be hazardous to your health, September 8, 2010

By 

Neil Gillespie - See all my reviews

This review is from: Overcoming the Devastation of Legal Abuse Syndrome (Paperback)

This book discusses the health implications of litigation and the challenges of representing yourself pro se. Karin Huffer describes how the legal profession and litigation has evolved into an institutionalized abuse of power. She articulates how people who get caught up in the courts experience a loss of trust in the justice system. Litigants loose vital rights and privileges and become helpless and overpowered. Often this is expressed by the court in the form of sanctions or other confiscation of your property. Karin says these takings have to do with powerful organizations, governments, agencies, and/or enforcement officials having the power to take private property purportedly for the purpose of enforcing the law, a regulation, or somehow acting on the line of duty. Karin calls these takings for what they are, legalized robbery, methods of stealing that are concealed in procedural confusion.

Karin discusses other books and resources, including David Marston's book Malice Aforethought, which I also recommend. Karin spends several chapters showing how to diagnose and heal yourself from the trauma of the courts, and she provides specific steps to follow. The book is like a friend who understands what you are going through when no one else does. I recommend reading the book, then going back and reading parts of it again as you encounter each new injustice in court system. Better yet, read the book before you get involved in a legal matter, and then avoid the courts, lawyers and judges like the plague.