Q: What happens if I sue a person for a job they didn’t do and I win the case but they don’t have the money to reimburse me
I paid a man to fix my car and he didn’t fix what needed to be fixed he didn’t want to give me my car back and once I report it stolen I have finally got it back from the police and saw that the damage was worse than before I want to take him to court if I win this case what will happen if he can’t pay me back my money gave him to fix the car. Will I just waste money by going to court or will he go to jail if he doesn’t pay.
A: This is America. No one ever "goes to jail" just because they owe you money.
A:
No, he will not go to jail for failure to pay a judgment entered in a civil case. If you sue him and recover a judgment, then it's up to you to try to collect that judgment. The most common ways courts help to collect judgments is to issue writs of garnishment for levy upon salary or bank accounts. If that happens, and you levy upon such assets, he could claim that the assets are exempt. If he can prove that his bank account is from exempt sources (Social Security, pension, child support, etc.), or that he pays the majority of support for the people living with him, he would get the money back.
In other words, as the expression goes, "you can't get money out of a turnup". If he is "judgment proof", a judgment wouldn't be worth much to you.
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