A court order is very easy to obtain in almost all juristictions
where only one side is represented. While natural justice would
demand that all parties (particularly the ones against who the
order/s are sought) be represented at a hearing or at least made
aware of it, in the real world that often doesn't happen.
I recently had the joy of having a previous order against me for a
relatively small sum voided. It was a tenancy dispute and my ex-
housemate the crazy person had gone to the tenancy tribunal and
gotten an order against me for $500 in supposedly unpaid rent. When I
received the letter from the tribunal saying they had found against
me and I owed him this money, I simply wrote in and explained that I
wanted a re-hearing as I was never notified of the first hearing.
After various rambling statements by my ex-housemate the crazy person
about what a terrible person I was and how I had skipped out owing
him all this money etc., I simply pointed out that despite what his
documents claimed he was not my landlord, we were co-tenants. Then he
produced the original lease (which I found out at a previous but
unconnected hearing for the same thing) which was never signed by the
owners and his star witness, the incredibly stupid woman from the
estate agents. The ISWFTEA gave her 'evidence' that she didn't really
know what was going on and that myself (and another unfortunate
person in the same predicament) were living at the house without her
permission. I simply asked her 'were you working at this estate
agency when this lease was negotiated and signed (by us)' and she
said no, she hadn't come to the firm until later. The Tribunal member
just said to her 'thank you, you can go'.
Eventually he had to explain to my ex-housemate the crazy person that
the residential tenancy tribunal only adjudicates disputes between
tenants and landlords, not private disputes between tenants. He was
suggesting that I could counter-claim against my ex-housemate for
driving me out and causing me so much aggravation but I said i really
couldn't be bothered.
As a post-script once we left the court room (but were still in the
building) my ex-housemate the crazy person started screaming at me
that I wasn't to go anywhere near the house or he would call the
police, and that he was 'instructing me' I was not to go to the house
and was to return the keys to him. As I pointed out to him that I was
still legally a co-tenant and he had never been able to get an
eviction order against me despite 3 attempts (in fact I was able to
keep the estate agent from evicting the whole lot of us because of
the way he was acting) I was quite within my rights to move back in
that afternoon. He then screamed some more and stomped out.
So this short story illustrates how even someone living in a fantasy
world with a defective brain can get a court order when they fail to
notify the opposition.
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