Recent Blog Posts
The Basics of Pulling a Job Applicant’s Credit Reports
More and more, employers are checking the credit of their potential employees, as a condition of employment. It has become so routine, there is just an assumption that it is always legal. But that’s not the case—in fact, if done improperly, pulling or checking credit can land your business in serious legal trouble under… Read More »
Ejectment and Eviction: Know the Difference
Trying to get someone out of your property? You may think you’re limited to an eviction. But evictions are strictly for tenants who have a landlord tenant relationship and, presumably, a lease (written or oral). But there are many situations where there is no lease, and where common sense tells us that the person… Read More »
Understanding the Proper Use of a Lis Pendens
Let’s say that you are in a lawsuit, and something about that lawsuit involves a piece of property, whether it’s a residential or commercial property, or even land. The dispute isn’t exactly a lawsuit yet. But you want to make sure that the world knows that there is some potential legal action that could… Read More »
Buying a Business? Here Are Things to Look For
When you are buying a business, or thinking of merging with a business, you will almost always have a period known as due diligence. This is your time to “check under the hood,” and see whether the purchase is a smart and potentially profitable one. But despite being given a time period to conduct… Read More »
Common Mistakes in Breach of Contract Cases
When you or your business have a contract with another party and they breach the contract, they are the party in the wrong. As the non-breaching party, and the party complying with the terms of the agreement, it may be hard to imagine that you could do anything wrong that would prevent you from… Read More »
Attorney Brendan A. Sweeney Of Sweeney Law, P.A. Featured In The July/August 2024 Edition Of The Broward County Bar Barrister – The Distinction Between Civil and Criminal Usury in Florida
Aristotle stated “[t]he most hated sort, and with the greatest reason, is usury, which makes a gain out of money itself, and not from the natural object of it. For money was intended to be used in exchange, but not to increase at interest. And this term interest, which means the birth of money… Read More »
Differentiated Case Management: How Does it Affect You?
If there’s one thing that people who have lawsuits complain about, it’s that the cases move too slow. It seemingly takes forever for a case to get to trial, or at least, to a point where the case is ready for mediation or some kind of serious settlement conference. Well, at least in Broward… Read More »
Handling Subpoenas for Documents and Records
If your company is not in any lawsuit, not suing anybody, and not getting sued, you’d expect to not be involved much with any court action. But then it happens: you get a subpoena—an official court document asking for you to appear and provide a stack of documents and records. What is this all… Read More »
Noncompete Agreements are Gone But You Can Still Protect Your Business
As you may have heard, the federal government, through the Department of Labor, recently passed a rule essentially outlawing the use of noncompete agreements. The rule even goes so far as to invalidate already existing noncompete agreements. And while the rule may or may not stick around, depending on the result of numerous court… Read More »
Is it Worth Suing a Debtor With No Assets to Satisfy a Judgment?
Let’s say that you have a contract or a debt, and you threaten to sue the other side to collect on the money that you feel is owed to you. The response from the debtor is something along the lines of: “Go ahead and sue me, I have nothing anyway, you’ll never get anything.”… Read More »
