Aqua Life v. Reyes: Can You Dismiss Your Florida Probate Claims Against You for “Lack of Prosecution?”

Its a sad but true statement that sometimes litigation is used as a tool  to harass rather than a tool to seek justice, especially in probate where this may hold up the distribution of your inheritance. Did you know that failure to attend to a lawsuit in Florida Probate Court may be grounds for dismissal in and of themselves? Learn more through a recent case out of the Third District Court of Appealthat serves Miami Dade County. 

• Dismissal for Lack of Prosecution is an all to common way to get a case dismissed(i.e. thrown out of court) when someone is not litigating or pursuing the claim against you. Usually failure to file any motions or conduct any hearing/discovery for six months will get you said relief, in fact in federal court its done automatically. Do you know what is better for you federal (diversity) court or state (Florida) court?
• But why would someone not pursue a case? Maybe that action was only brought to frustrate you and your purposes, maybe the case turned out to be a loser and the otherattoney has not taken the time to withdraw, whatever the reason courts do not like to have their dockets clogged up with stale cases.
• So what happens if your sister filed a probate claim to keep the family inheritance in limbo? Now if she waits out that case to long, you can just get it dismissed right?

Florida third DCA tells a party too late, you didnt act on your claim and now its gone, and appealing that order will not bring relief necessarily.

• On January 28, 2015 the Florida Third District Court of Appeals filed its opinion in the interesting case of Aqua Life Corp. v. Humberto Reyes
• In February of 2013 a case was dismissed for failure to prosecute it and that order was never appealed, more than 18 months later the plaintiff in the case below filed for a status conference, to find otu the case had been dismissed. The claim that he was not aware of the hearing was not enough to overturn the decision and the case remained dismissed.
• Do you think this is fair? What if it was his attorney who got too busy, is that malpractice?
• Palm Beach Probate Lawyers know that time is of the essence and that stale lawsuits do not bring good results.
• Want to learn more? Check out the whole case here.