They had been naive, they later realized. They thought Maine’s legal system would work for them.

But that often isn’t the case in the state’s small claims courts, a Sun Journal survey shows.

When a mechanic charged Michael and Priscilla Delahanty of Otisfield almost $3,000 for a transmission overhaul even though it only needed a $600 part; when the overhaul went bad only 400 miles later and they had to pay almost $4,000 for a new transmission; and when they then learned the car was only worth $5,400, they figured Maine’s small claims court would make it right.

After all, everyone knows the court is where the little guy who gets taken to the cleaners can get his money back. It is billed as a simple, speedy and informal court procedure. Cheap. No lawyers. The do-it-yourself alternative.

“It seemed so cut and dried to us,” said Priscilla Delahanty.

“We were babes in the woods,” Michael Delahanty said. “We thought it would be a relatively quick process. … We expected the legal system to make him honor our contract.”

But what the couple got was a numbing education in the legal system, hours spent waiting in court and mounting costs in an effort to recover their money – and that’s after they “won” their case. (See related story.)

The Delahantys’ tale isn’t the exception. Instead, it appears to be the rule in Maine’s small claims courts. An informal survey conducted by the Sun Journal found that of the hundreds of people each year who receive small claims judgments in their favor in Androscoggin, Franklin and Oxford counties, roughly two-thirds of them did not collect their money.

No guarantees

No one knows just how many people who go through small claims court in Maine are ultimately rewarded for their efforts.

Clerks at district courts in the tri-county area said they don’t track which defendants have paid the full judgment amount and which debts are outstanding.

But those clerks estimate that people who launched small claims cases and won ultimately got their money only one-quarter to one-third of the time.

When people file suit in Lewiston District Court, Clerk Susan Bement pulls no punches.

“I tell them small claims is not a guarantee you’re going to get your money,” she said. She cites cases up to 4 years old where people are still trying to collect.

How many people have waited that long? How many have actually gotten their money? How many have just given up? No one can say.

Several court clerks have expressed frustration over the fact that the courts do not track that information. They have asked repeatedly that the court system include in its small claims literature a request that plaintiffs report back to the court whether or not they collect their money and, if so, how much of the judgment they collected.

But Sherry Wilkins, statistician for Maine’s courts, said the law governing small claims courts doesn’t allow the state to ask for that information.

Whose side are they on?

Like the Delahantys, Monique Morin believed the courts would help her recover the cost of her son’s smashed car. Less than three months after she bought it for him to use at college, an uninsured motorist rear-ended the car, totaling it.

That was January 2003. The judge ruled in Morin’s favor in March 2004 when the woman who drove the other car failed to show up in court.

Now, a year and a half after the accident, Morin said she’s received nothing, “not a dime.” “She’s working and going on with her life and just screws me,” said Morin, a resident of Randolph in Kennebec County.

Morin said she has paid more than $200 in various court filing fees, including more than $100 for sheriff’s deputies to serve the woman papers summoning her to court – all part of the small claims process. She also must drive nearly an hour to Lewiston District Court for each hearing because the woman she sued lives in Sabattus.

“Who are they accommodating here?” she said.

Her experience has caused Morin to lose faith in the courts.

“I don’t believe in the judicial system at all,” she said. “I don’t think it protects the person.”

The judge ordered the woman to pay Morin $20 every two weeks because the woman, who works two part-time jobs, said $20 a week was a hardship. She owes a total of $3,215 plus court costs.

At that rate, the debt would be repaid in more than six years, long after Morin’s son has graduated from college,

and that would be only if the woman adheres to the judge’s instructions without missing a single payment.

“She’s already six weeks behind,” Morin said.

Collecting the debt

Small claims court is divided into two separate parts: the first is judgment; the second is collection, which is often referred to as “disclosure.” Most of the complaints center on the disclosure process.

Trudy DeSalle, clerk at Rumford District Court, acknowledged most plaintiffs who receive a favorable judgment must embark on the often lengthy and time-consuming disclosure process in order to collect their money, or even hope to.

In essence, this is how it works:

• If a judgment isn’t paid within 30 days, the plaintiff can bring the defendant into small claims disclosure court.

• That is where the court and the plaintiff learn how much the defendant is worth in assets and income, which is used to determine the defendant’s ability to pay the judgment.

• If the defendant doesn’t show up for the hearing, the plaintiff may pay a sheriff’s deputy to make a civil arrest and escort the defendant into court.

Each of those steps costs the plaintiff money, which he or she can attempt to recoup through the court.

Paul Cote Jr., a District Court judge who presides over cases in Lewiston and other tri-county courts, agrees with Bement, clerk of the Lewiston District Court: Just because you won your case does not mean you’ll go home happy, with money in your pocket.

“Getting a judgment – that’s a piece of paper – and collecting on the judgment, are two different things,” he said. “And that is the difficult situation for any successful plaintiff … once you get your judgment, that sometimes is only half the battle. And sometimes less than half of the battle. Collecting on the judgment is really what the plaintiff is seeking to begin with. And that is not easy at times.”

The court calls certain people “judgment proof.” That means they don’t have sufficient assets and income to pay a judgment, no matter how clear-cut the small claims case against them, Cote said.

For instance, the first $35,000 of the equity of a defendant’s home is protected against a claim, or $70,000 if it’s jointly owned. It goes up to $140,000 if the defendant is disabled or age 60 or older. The first $5,000 of a motor vehicle is beyond the reach of the plaintiff.

Social Security checks, and veterans and disability benefits, whatever their amount, can’t be touched, he said.

There are 14 other exemptions, including up to $750 in jewelry, $5,000 in professional tools and $200 in any particular item of furniture, clothing, musical instruments, household appliances, books or crops held primarily for the personal, family or household use. Also exempt is a commercial fishing boat, life insurance policy, life insurance proceeds and $12,500 of a personal injury judgment.

“The law will protect people up to certain levels of income and their own assets and expenses,” he said. The burden of proof rests with the person bringing the suit, even if they won a judgment.

“There are many defendants, frankly, who are judgment-proof,” Cote said. If a defendant files for bankruptcy, the small claims case is immediately sent over to bankruptcy court.

“People have done it and they do it every day: They discharge themselves from thousands and tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands (of dollars) or more of obligations,” Cote said.

If the court determines that a defendant cannot afford to pay and does not have the assets, the case will be dropped. After six months, the plaintiff is allowed to bring the defendant back to disclosure court.

“Unless that (defendant’s) financial situation changes dramatically, there’s probably not going to be a very different result,” Cote said.

“We do not have a debtor’s prison in the state of Maine,” he said. “Those went out a long time ago.”

Morin says that’s not fair.

“These people should go to jail until they pay their freakin’ fines,” she said.

Not perfect

Not everyone has a problem with the small claims system.

Suing in Lewiston District Court for the $825 she’d paid as a security deposit on an apartment, Auburn resident Harriet Wilcox said she is satisfied with the system.

Like the Delahantys, she won her case by default. Unlike them, she actually collected the money due her, although it took nearly a year.

“I didn’t have any problem at all,” she said, aside from finding the process somewhat slow and having to take two days off from work. She had accrued some time off, she said, so she didn’t lose any pay.

But Wilcox is in the minority.

At some point, Cote acknowledged, many plaintiffs grow frustrated and simply give up.

“Again, you’re talking about repeated trips to the courthouse, and how much effort and time and expense do plaintiffs want to spend to collect on their judgment?” he asked. “If you’re suing somebody who has the money to pay, then ultimately if you win your case, you’re probably going to get paid. If you’re suing somebody who doesn’t have much wherewithal to begin with, then it can be a very uphill climb and a very frustrating thing.”

Oil and gas companies, credit unions, banks and hospitals comprise the bulk of plaintiffs hoping to get their money in small claims court. They often spend a lot of time there, and in the process see familiar names on the docket.

Most private parties, however, will go to court only once in their lifetime. Chances are, they won’t recognize the name of the defendant as somebody who is judgment-proof, and, therefore, they won’t cut their losses before initiating a small claims suit, Cote said.

“And because they’ve come to court, the natural, understandable attitude I think plaintiffs have (is), Well, I’ve won my case. Why am I not getting paid?’ And they’re looking to the courts to solve that problem, and the court has to operate under a legal framework of being able to resolve that problem,” he said.

Cote said he doesn’t remember an instance of a plaintiff taking matters into his or her own hands after getting nowhere in court.

“I can’t say I’ve never seen it, but that would be extremely rare,” he said.

“I think it’s very rare because we have a legal process to resolve disputes in this country. It’s not a perfect system by any means. I think it’s impossible to devise a perfect system. That doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t try to make it better. I’m sure there are ways to improve it.”

Yet it is better than the alternative, he said, where people seeking small claims might have to pay that much or more just to hire a lawyer.

People who come to small claims court need a forum to seek justice, even if they come away feeling they did not get it because they never recovered their money. They can always try again, Cote said.

For the Delahantys, there probably won’t be a next time.

If they had it to do over again, knowing what they now know about small claims court, they say they wouldn’t bother.

“I don’t think it’s worth it,” Michael Delahanty said. “Even if it’s just the principle.”