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Pro Se Guide to Family Courtand this applies not just to the men, but also to the women as familycourt judges enjoy sending the women to jail just to make an example ofthem and to balance out the numbers. So just as you risk crashing eachtime you fly in an airplane, you always risk jailing each time you go tofamily court, even though the risk is small, it always exists.As long as you enter the family court with good faith and clean hands,which I go into detail to explain, you will be able to minimize your risk ofbeing jailed. But since the risk cannot be reduced to zero, I have addeda supplemental chapter at the end of this book that details how toprepare and survive in jail should you ever find yourself going to jail.Now that I have made this brief introduction and provided some caution,I can proceed to turn you into a family court litigator. Only afterreading this book, including the final chapter on constant litigation, canyou then make the decision, weighing in your desires to be a fit and ableand involved parent in your children’s lives, and mixing in the costs,benefits, and risks, to be able to make a final and informed decision toproceed to meet your ex-spouse on the field of battle that we call thefamily court.Lastly, early on in the book, I provide three existing alternatives to evengoing family court in the first place, with the hopes that you and yourex-spouse can use either of them to save both of you from family court.Otherwise, this book is dedicated to those that are going to have toprepare for family court, but just in case when you finish the book youdecide then more than ever, that you really don’t want to go to familycourt, I’ll give you yet another and final way to avoid family court.1.4 What does “Pro Se” mean?Being Pro Se means that you are going to court by yourself and withoutthe representation of a lawyer, but if you ask a judge, or a lawyer, orsearch the internet for what the means, you will find the commondefinition of “Pro Se” {Pro’say} as meaning “For Yourself.” This isincorrect. Unfortunately, in my youth I had to take six years of Latinand Roman history, so I had a feeling that definition was not right. MyLatin dictionaries did not help much, other to confirm that “Pro” and“Se” in that order violated the rules of Latin, so it can’t really have a11

David A. Bardesvalid translation. I had to do deep searching of historic Roman texts tofind the usage.I can now say with some certainty that the term “Pro Se” is used onlyonce in Roman texts. It was used by the famous Roman orator and poet,Ovid. In Roman times, lawyers were called “orators” as orators had tobe highly educated and effective at communication. Ovid may beconsidered Rome’s most effective orator as he stood up in court andargued his cases in complete and accurate poetry stanzas. The wordsand stanzas he spoke followed all the rules of poetry. He wowed andshocked the court to such an extent that Rome exiled him to a far awayisland for the rest of his life. While on the exiled island, Ovid wrote thebulk of his poetry for which he is so famous. It is in one of his wellknown poems that he used the term, “Pro Se.”In Latin, the only time you can break the rules is to make a joke as insatire. In the sentence where “Pro Se” is found, it was used satiricallyand without getting to deep into the context, Ovid defined “Pro Se” asmeaning “trying to hold on.” It is ironic that the United States courtsuse “Pro Se” because that is exactly the situation Pro Se litigants face inthe courts. A judge once started my hearing by saying, “Mr. Bardes, areyou representing yourself Pro Se today?” All I heard in my brain was,“Are you trying to hold on today?” And that was just about right.The correct Latin term that really applies to self-representation is “SuiJuris” {Sue’ee Jer’us}. In Latin, the definition of Sui Juris is “To me, tome, belongs the truth.” In Latin the use of repetition means emphasis,so the double use of “to me” connotes importance. Today, the meaning ofSui Juris translates as, “I am a citizen and I claim all my rights,especially to the Bill of Rights, and I call upon the court to recognize myrights and privileges that comes with citizenry.” The correct use is madeorally in court at the beginning of a session by stating your legal name,then claiming Sui Juris, as in, “I AM David Bardes, Sui Juris.” This putsthe court and all officers of the court on notice. The use of “I AM” sendsthe notice that you are claiming your rights to exist as a natural citizenborn with all your natural rights. Also, your pleadings can be signedwith “I AM” followed by your name then the use of title of Sui Juris. Thisuse of Sui Juris faded out long ago and is no longer in use. The only12

Pro Se Guide to Family Courtplace you might find the use of Sui Juris is somewhere buried in yourstate’s constitution. As an example, the last sentence in the SouthCarolina constitution states, “All citizen’s deemed Sui Juris.”My advice to you is to not use Sui Juris unless you want to have somefun stumping people that have no idea what it means; just embrace theuse of “Pro Se” in court and in your pleadings. As an example of thespoof usage, I titled the byline of this book, “By David A. Bardes, SuiJuris.” I did this because I thought it would make a potential buyerthink that I was somehow a lawyer to which they would buy the bookthinking I was a legal authority when in reality I am a Pro Se litigant aswell. If I fooled you I am sorry, my motivation was, as I have alreadyexplained, is to help you and your children from becoming furthervictims of family court, as well as to bring down the entire family courtenterprise racket. I caveat this spoof by saying and proving to you lateron, that I do have 8 years of legal study, 4 years of family court litigationexperience, and 5 years of federal court litigation experience includingtaking a case to the United States Supreme Court. I go into furtherdetail on my legal knowledge and experience later on and also explainway a BAR lawyer could never write this book and why, but I wantassure you that what I have been able to do Pro Se, is freely available toyou because both of us are equal before the law as being Pro Se.1.5 Assumptions Supporting This BookI assume you love your children and want to be viable and very muchinvolved in their daily lives. I have to make this assumption becausethere are many parents that don’t want to be involved and aren’t willingto do anything and everything to remain viable, but the fact that you arereading this book means you have great interest, so my assumption isgrounded.I also assume you are going to be a Pro Se litigant and that your exspouse is going to have a top flight attorney in court. This book has thegreatest use if you are going to square off with an attorney. Going upagainst a lawyer is very difficult and I explain why, but you will be ableto disable the lawyer for short periods, and if you keep up the attacks,you may disable the lawyer for the rest of the hearing. I will explain how13

David A. Bardesto attack the lawyer in later chapters and will give you examples in thelitigation chapter. Otherwise, if your ex-spouse is going to be Pro Se,then that is great as it gives you more advantages and a quicker path tobeing able to get what you want from family court.1.6 Who is the Target Audience of this Book?This book applies to many different audiences and I will explain, butfirst I want to state that this book should be the first thing you read andalso the last thing you should have to put to use. The reason why itshould be the first thing you should read is to either convince yourselfnot to put yourself into the jurisdiction of the family courts in the firstplace and how to avoid the family courts altogether. This book doesprovide and describe three options you can use as alternatives to familycourt.The reason why you should use the information in this book as the lastthing you should put to use is that you may have no choice, as you haveno money for a lawyer and you are shortly going to be subject to thefamily courts and are going to have to represent yourself as Pro Se.With that said, this book first applies to those divorced, or soon to bedivorced, couples with or without children and with or without currentlegal documents governing their behavior. Next, the book applies to allmarried couples that have strong marriages as both husband and wifeand have no plans to divorce. These folks face a grim 50% chance inhaving to rely on this book in order to save themselves, their property,and their children’s futures. One of the greatest fears married couplesface, but will not admit, is that they already know of the horrors theywould face should their marriages fail. Therefore, this book can bothcause enough concern to make sure their marriages do not collapse, andat the same time give them comfort that should the worse happen,neither will go anywhere near family court, but rather seek the availablealternatives to family court.The next group that can benefit are young couples engaged or maybecome engaged to be married. This book can allow the couple to discussin advance what they would do in the event of the termination of their14

Pro Se Guide to Family Courtrelationship. When fears are alleviated both can commit more fully toeach other and with more certainty.The last group that this book can help is for every graduating 12th gradehigh school student upon becoming a United States citizen at age 18.This book can cause pause before engaging in casual sex as it teachesthe responsibility that is mutually consented to by both the women andthe man when they proceed with sexual intercourse for pleasure thatleads to parenthood. There is just no such thing as a 100% effectivecontraceptive. The risk of becoming parents is always present.1.7 Distribution of this BookI choose to publish this book from just about everywhere books are foundincluding all the new techno-book gadgets. The book is available as apaperback book that can be ordered from Amazon.com, bookstores,major online and offline r

3.13 Weasel Words 3.14 Torts 3.15 Criminal Allegations, Admissions of Crime 3.16 Existing Criminal Records 3.17 Charges for Domestic Violence 3.18 Claiming, Defending Religion 3.19