Legal Aid

Last Updated on Monday, 31 January 2011 12:25

Who can apply for Legal Aid and where?

In case of persons without income or property, the treasury assumes the expenses for lawyer and court. Legal aid will assume, according to income and earnings, the entire or part of the own contribution to court expenses and the cost of a lawyer.

However legal aid does not assume the expenses for the disputant or his expenses for a lawyer. The loser of the law suit must therefore, even if he was granted legal aid, as a rule pay for the expenses of his adversary.

An exception is made for disputes under labour law: here, the loser of the first instance does not have to carry the costs for his adversary. Whoever has no property and whose income does not exceed € 15 is fully exempted. That is to say he has to carry neither the court expenses not the cost of his own lawyer.

The calculated income is not equal to “net income” but worked out as follows: taxes, provisionary expenses (such as social security) and income related expenses are deducted

Further deductions are:

Exemptions of € 354 each for the person and his or her spouse or partner as well as € 256 for every other person for whom the party is liable to provide maintenance (amount on 01.07.2004), full accommodation costs (rent, maintenance costs, heating), possibly further amounts with regard to special handicaps / impositions (such as a physical handicap).

The remainder is the income which determines whether legal aid is granted.

An application, in which the evidence is to be presented, is to be handed in to the trial court. A declaration of the personal and economic circumstances is to be attached. A pre-printed form is available for this declaration.

District Court Neukoelln
Karl-Marx Street 77-79
12043 Berlin
Tel.: 49 (0) 3090191-0...
http://www.berlin.de/