I need some legal advice or legal aid. My neighbour is an old woman with a lot of time and a fair amount of money; she's been complaining that my dogs bark all day and all night and, despite the fact that I've kept her informed on my progress (like buying an anti-bark system, trying different methods to keep them from barking, and now calling someone from Bark Busters to come help me with their separation anxiety problem), she's now threatening to take me to court.
Her 40-year-old son, who lives with her, came knocking at my door at midnight last night (?!) to inform me that she gets legal aid with her insurance and she's been seriously discussing calling and filing a lawsuit. Now, my problem is that I don't have money to go to court, and I've gone to speak with her repeatedly to ask about the progress with my dogs and to update her on the actions I'm taking to resolve the issue but she's shown herself to be very uncooperative in that respect, even going so far as to accuse me of being negligent towards my dogs. Now it's true that, for the past few months, my mother and brother and I have ended up with major scheduling conflicts so sometimes the dogs are left home alone for many hours, but usually if we're going to be gone for more than eight hours at a time, my brother does come home in the middle of the day to let them out and make sure they have fresh water and stuff, plus it's not like my dogs don't get toys or activities while we're gone, or exercise or food or water. This is not a long-term arrangement; it's just temporary bad scheduling. It's not like my dogs are ill or unhappy, they just have separation anxiety (which is a common problem in many dogs, especially considering that for mine, one dog was abused as a puppy before we got her, and the other is used to having a human around all the time; neither of them barks when left alone but when together, they encourage each other to howl).
I'm assuming that if she takes me to court, it'll be civil court but I don't know if it's small claims or not because I don't know what she intends to sue me for; I checked the government websites and it seems to me that small claims is only for business transactions and things like that? I don't even know what she could take me to court for. I don't know if she wants to make me give my dogs up, or if she wants to sue me for emotional distress, or if she's going to try to cite negligence or something in order to have my dogs taken away from me. I've been told that in small claims court, it's possible to request a meeting with a mediator as an alternative to going to court, but I need to know if this would be an option in my case.
Another problem is that our house belongs to my mother and the animals are registered under her name because she paid their licenses, but they are not her animals. She is not responsible for them or this situation; she's never even at our house anymore. If the court says that my neighbours have to file a lawsuit against her, I'm going to lose my dogs because she really couldn't care less, she doesn't even want me to keep our second dog anyway. I need my neighbours to be dealing with me. Is this going to be a problem if the dogs are licensed under her name? Can I call the licensing office or whatever and have them changed to be registered under my name, or does it work based on who owns the property, or what?
I've already informed my neighbour that the dog trainer is coming on Sunday and she was very rude about it and implied that I was lying to her; I offered to have him come over so that she could meet him and she was again very rude. I'm doing my best to be understanding and respectful of her feelings as well as to solve the problem as quickly as possible, but I think she has her mind set on getting my dogs taken away from me and she won't be satisfied any other way. Obviously, any animal-lover will see where my problem lies: I refuse to get rid of my second dog because she would be euthanised, she's too old to be taken into a shelter and the whole reason I adopted her in the first place was a last resort because she couldn't find another home (not to mention, I LOVE HER?) but at the same time, I'm afraid that if I have to go to court, I may end up losing her regardless of the fact that since being informed of the problem, I have been working to get it fixed, in a series of escalating methods.
Unfortunately, I didn't keep receipts or anything for the anti-bark system or the things I bought, because I didn't realize that the situation would ever get this far. I don't know what grounds my neighbour can sue me on, since the only proof she has are testimonials from herself and my other neighbours (we live in a townhouse so their houses are both attached to mine) and possibly her son, plus maybe she can call on the fact that she filed a police complaint (we had the police come to our house to warn us that if it happened again, we could get ticketed, and I thanked them and told them that I had been informed of the problem and was working towards a solution but that I would continue to keep in contact with my neighbour to check on the progress of the situation). Whereas, on my side, I have my brother and mother who can vouch for the fact that I have been working to remedy the problem, and I have my dog trainer who can say that I did contact him to ask for his help and that I am working on it to the best of my ability. But what it comes down to is that it's her word against mine, and I don't know how far either of us can get in a court of law based solely on word against word.
I need to find out what the animal by-laws are in Quebec (I live on the South Shore, if it makes a difference), what she could sue me for, what my options are and how I can protect and/or prepare myself. What could the court rule? I assume that they would probably say that I have to fix the problem by such a deadline or else the dogs will be taken away, is this a fair assumption? Where can I call to get this information? What else can I do?
![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/community.gif){kind=small}
![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small}
depressed
should be working
blah