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	<title>Comments for Divorce 101</title>
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	<link>http://charlesamessina.com</link>
	<description>Heart Breaks, Head Aches and the Art of Equitable Distribution</description>
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		<title>Comment on Intro to Evidence: &#8220;I&#8217;ve Got Proof!!!&#8221;  (or In Support of the Humble Document) by Charles Messina</title>
		<link>http://charlesamessina.com/?p=58&#038;cpage=1#comment-40333</link>
		<dc:creator>Charles Messina</dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Mon, 10 Dec 2012 14:57:38 +0000</pubDate>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://charlesamessina.com/?p=58#comment-40333</guid>
		<description>Well, I guess learned counsel (who didn&#039;t even bother to leave a name other than &quot;UR Wrong&quot;) has had different experiences with introducing evidence at trial.
Successfully introducing text messages into evidence at trial requires some real legal gymnastics, at least in New York, as they are not &quot;completely admissible.&quot;
Frankly, I&#039;ve never heard of anything being &quot;completely admissible&quot; and I&#039;m not sure what the term means.  I can say conclusively that I never ran into the term in law school, on the bar exam, or in all my trial experience.

As I&#039;ve written, potential evidence must be relevant and there must be a foundation laid for it before it is admissible.
I don&#039;t know of any evidence in any type of case that is &quot;completely admissible&quot; without being relevant and being properly authenticated.  

If one begins from the premise of UR Wrong, that text messages are &quot;completely admissible,&quot; the next question one must ask is how they would be introduced into evidence.
This seems to be an issue Mr. Wrong overlooked.  This could be done in a number of ways.
One could bring the phone and enter it into evidence.  I think this is a poor choice for several reasons including the fact that your phone would have to stay at the court for the duration of the trial and any subsequent appeal.
One could subpoena the text messages directly from the service provider.  I&#039;ve done this in the past and can tell you with certainty that the actual text messages on the server are only kept for 2-3 days then deleted.  I was told (by verizon, I believe) that this is due to the sheer volume of text messages sent on a daily basis and the finite server size would render it impossible for them to retain all text messages sent for much longer than that.
Another option is to print the text messages out somehow.  Perhaps by emailing them to yourself (not all phones have this capability), or by having a data recovery expert pull them off the phone and print them and then come and testify as to how it was done and that they remain unadulterated (pricey).  Some people plop the phone on a copy machine (usually turns out looking not so good if readable at all).
No matter what method one uses to actually turn the text messages into an admissible format, each method can be attacked in voir dire.  Sometimes successfully, sometimes not.

And yet another hurdle remains:  How does one prove who was typing on the other phone at the time?  If the other party gets up on the stand and states his or her phone was lost/stolen the day before the horrible text message was sent, produces a police report to that effect (it&#039;s pretty easy to file a police report for a lost or stolen cell phone) and testifies that he or she did not send that text, you&#039;re going to have problems with both admissibility and weight.

Nevertheless, I invite the reader to check some other sources, and I invite &quot;UR Wrong&quot; to qualify his (or her) statements and provide some context for those comments:
&lt;a href=&quot;http://blog.ceb.com/2011/09/30/how-do-you-get-text-messages-into-evidence-authenticate-authenticate-authenticate/http://&quot; title=&quot;Intro to Evidence&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;&lt;/a&gt;
&lt;a href=&quot;http://www.avvo.com/legal-answers/entering-text-messages-into-evidence-606246.html&quot; title=&quot;Thoughts of other Attorneys&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;&lt;/a&gt;</description>
		<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>Well, I guess learned counsel (who didn&#8217;t even bother to leave a name other than &#8220;UR Wrong&#8221;) has had different experiences with introducing evidence at trial.<br />
Successfully introducing text messages into evidence at trial requires some real legal gymnastics, at least in New York, as they are not &#8220;completely admissible.&#8221;<br />
Frankly, I&#8217;ve never heard of anything being &#8220;completely admissible&#8221; and I&#8217;m not sure what the term means.  I can say conclusively that I never ran into the term in law school, on the bar exam, or in all my trial experience.</p>
<p>As I&#8217;ve written, potential evidence must be relevant and there must be a foundation laid for it before it is admissible.<br />
I don&#8217;t know of any evidence in any type of case that is &#8220;completely admissible&#8221; without being relevant and being properly authenticated.  </p>
<p>If one begins from the premise of UR Wrong, that text messages are &#8220;completely admissible,&#8221; the next question one must ask is how they would be introduced into evidence.<br />
This seems to be an issue Mr. Wrong overlooked.  This could be done in a number of ways.<br />
One could bring the phone and enter it into evidence.  I think this is a poor choice for several reasons including the fact that your phone would have to stay at the court for the duration of the trial and any subsequent appeal.<br />
One could subpoena the text messages directly from the service provider.  I&#8217;ve done this in the past and can tell you with certainty that the actual text messages on the server are only kept for 2-3 days then deleted.  I was told (by verizon, I believe) that this is due to the sheer volume of text messages sent on a daily basis and the finite server size would render it impossible for them to retain all text messages sent for much longer than that.<br />
Another option is to print the text messages out somehow.  Perhaps by emailing them to yourself (not all phones have this capability), or by having a data recovery expert pull them off the phone and print them and then come and testify as to how it was done and that they remain unadulterated (pricey).  Some people plop the phone on a copy machine (usually turns out looking not so good if readable at all).<br />
No matter what method one uses to actually turn the text messages into an admissible format, each method can be attacked in voir dire.  Sometimes successfully, sometimes not.</p>
<p>And yet another hurdle remains:  How does one prove who was typing on the other phone at the time?  If the other party gets up on the stand and states his or her phone was lost/stolen the day before the horrible text message was sent, produces a police report to that effect (it&#8217;s pretty easy to file a police report for a lost or stolen cell phone) and testifies that he or she did not send that text, you&#8217;re going to have problems with both admissibility and weight.</p>
<p>Nevertheless, I invite the reader to check some other sources, and I invite &#8220;UR Wrong&#8221; to qualify his (or her) statements and provide some context for those comments:<br />
<a href="http://blog.ceb.com/2011/09/30/how-do-you-get-text-messages-into-evidence-authenticate-authenticate-authenticate/http://" title="Intro to Evidence" rel="nofollow"></a><br />
<a href="http://www.avvo.com/legal-answers/entering-text-messages-into-evidence-606246.html" title="Thoughts of other Attorneys" rel="nofollow"></a></p>
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		<title>Comment on Intro to Evidence: &#8220;I&#8217;ve Got Proof!!!&#8221;  (or In Support of the Humble Document) by UR Wrong</title>
		<link>http://charlesamessina.com/?p=58&#038;cpage=1#comment-40258</link>
		<dc:creator>UR Wrong</dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Sun, 09 Dec 2012 21:01:42 +0000</pubDate>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://charlesamessina.com/?p=58#comment-40258</guid>
		<description>This is a terrible article written by someone who knows nothing about divorce litigation. For instance, text messages are completely admissible, and to insinuate that you would need to give your phone to the judge is absurd. Perhaps you ought to go to law school before giving legal advice.</description>
		<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>This is a terrible article written by someone who knows nothing about divorce litigation. For instance, text messages are completely admissible, and to insinuate that you would need to give your phone to the judge is absurd. Perhaps you ought to go to law school before giving legal advice.</p>
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		<title>Comment on Sentence for Domestic Violence:  Red Lobster &amp; Bowling by Lutz Law</title>
		<link>http://charlesamessina.com/?p=141&#038;cpage=1#comment-25671</link>
		<dc:creator>Lutz Law</dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Tue, 10 Jul 2012 20:54:04 +0000</pubDate>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://charlesamessina.com/?p=141#comment-25671</guid>
		<description>I applaud the judge. Had we gotten that advice, I may not be looking for a divorce lawyer in Tacoma.</description>
		<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>I applaud the judge. Had we gotten that advice, I may not be looking for a divorce lawyer in Tacoma.</p>
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		<title>Comment on No-Fault Divorce&#8230; what is it? by Faustino Lippy</title>
		<link>http://charlesamessina.com/?p=53&#038;cpage=1#comment-24187</link>
		<dc:creator>Faustino Lippy</dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Mon, 25 Jun 2012 10:17:50 +0000</pubDate>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://charlesamessina.com/?p=53#comment-24187</guid>
		<description>Nice read, I just passed this onto a colleague who was doing some research on that. And he just bought me lunch as I found it for him smile Therefore let me rephrase that: Thanks for lunch!</description>
		<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>Nice read, I just passed this onto a colleague who was doing some research on that. And he just bought me lunch as I found it for him smile Therefore let me rephrase that: Thanks for lunch!</p>
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		<title>Comment on What About the House??? by Willy Henly</title>
		<link>http://charlesamessina.com/?p=30&#038;cpage=1#comment-24185</link>
		<dc:creator>Willy Henly</dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Mon, 25 Jun 2012 10:17:49 +0000</pubDate>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://charlesamessina.com/?p=30#comment-24185</guid>
		<description>Just what I was looking  for,  regards  for  putting up.</description>
		<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>Just what I was looking  for,  regards  for  putting up.</p>
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		<title>Comment on 5 Myths About Divorce in New York by Tyler Mayben</title>
		<link>http://charlesamessina.com/?p=18&#038;cpage=1#comment-24184</link>
		<dc:creator>Tyler Mayben</dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Mon, 25 Jun 2012 10:17:48 +0000</pubDate>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://charlesamessina.com/?p=18#comment-24184</guid>
		<description>My brother suggested I might like this blog. He was entirely right. This post truly made my day. You cann&#039;t imagine simply how much time I had spent for this info! Thanks!</description>
		<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>My brother suggested I might like this blog. He was entirely right. This post truly made my day. You cann&#8217;t imagine simply how much time I had spent for this info! Thanks!</p>
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		<title>Comment on Who gets the Gold Medal? by Jason</title>
		<link>http://charlesamessina.com/?p=134&#038;cpage=1#comment-21135</link>
		<dc:creator>Jason</dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Sun, 27 May 2012 13:55:47 +0000</pubDate>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://charlesamessina.com/?p=134#comment-21135</guid>
		<description>Nice post which Gold is worth a lot of money right now. Maybe the medal should be sold, or melted down and sold for the gold value alone and the proceeds split. Should her husband be entitled to anything at all relating to the Gold Medal, even though she may not have won the medal without his advice and assistance. Thanks a lot for posting this article.</description>
		<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>Nice post which Gold is worth a lot of money right now. Maybe the medal should be sold, or melted down and sold for the gold value alone and the proceeds split. Should her husband be entitled to anything at all relating to the Gold Medal, even though she may not have won the medal without his advice and assistance. Thanks a lot for posting this article.</p>
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		<title>Comment on Who Gets the Dog After the Divorce? by Tom</title>
		<link>http://charlesamessina.com/?p=145&#038;cpage=1#comment-19931</link>
		<dc:creator>Tom</dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Tue, 15 May 2012 13:22:20 +0000</pubDate>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://charlesamessina.com/?p=145#comment-19931</guid>
		<description>Charles, How could I possibly put a price tag on such an animal? She&#039;s priceless to me anyway</description>
		<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>Charles, How could I possibly put a price tag on such an animal? She&#8217;s priceless to me anyway</p>
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		<title>Comment on Who Gets the Dog After the Divorce? by Tom</title>
		<link>http://charlesamessina.com/?p=145&#038;cpage=1#comment-19930</link>
		<dc:creator>Tom</dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Tue, 15 May 2012 13:18:40 +0000</pubDate>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://charlesamessina.com/?p=145#comment-19930</guid>
		<description>sorry well being</description>
		<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>sorry well being</p>
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		<title>Comment on Who Gets the Dog After the Divorce? by Tom</title>
		<link>http://charlesamessina.com/?p=145&#038;cpage=1#comment-19929</link>
		<dc:creator>Tom</dc:creator>
		<pubDate>Tue, 15 May 2012 13:12:58 +0000</pubDate>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://charlesamessina.com/?p=145#comment-19929</guid>
		<description>Oh Sorry. I live in Michigan. It&#039;s a no fault divorce state. I was told by many, that since the dog has been in my possession and I pay for everything concerning her wee-being, I can keep her. I just need to make sure because it would be terrible if I were to lose her.</description>
		<content:encoded><![CDATA[<p>Oh Sorry. I live in Michigan. It&#8217;s a no fault divorce state. I was told by many, that since the dog has been in my possession and I pay for everything concerning her wee-being, I can keep her. I just need to make sure because it would be terrible if I were to lose her.</p>
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