Legal Definitions - collateral affinity

A collateral attack refers to a legal challenge against a court's judgment or decision in a separate legal proceeding, rather than through a direct appeal to a higher court.

Essentially, it's an attempt to undermine or invalidate a previously issued judgment by arguing that it was fundamentally flawed or ineffective, often due to issues that were not, or could not have been, raised during the original trial or a direct appeal. The goal is to prevent the judgment from being recognized or enforced.

Examples of Collateral Attack:

• Imagine a person convicted of a crime who, several years after their conviction has been finalized and all direct appeals have been exhausted, files a special motion in court. In this motion, they argue that their constitutional right to effective legal representation was violated because their trial attorney made critical errors that fundamentally undermined the fairness of their trial. This is a collateral attack because it's not a direct appeal of the errors made during the trial itself, but a separate legal action challenging the underlying validity of the conviction based on a fundamental flaw in the process.

• Consider a situation where a business in State A obtains a monetary judgment against an individual. When the business attempts to enforce that judgment against the individual's assets in State B, the individual might argue that the court in State A never had the proper legal authority (jurisdiction) over them to begin with. This challenge to the State A judgment, raised in a new proceeding in State B, is a collateral attack because it questions the original judgment's fundamental legitimacy rather than appealing its specific findings or legal interpretations.

• Suppose a couple divorced several years ago, and the divorce decree included a property division. Later, one ex-spouse discovers compelling evidence that the other intentionally concealed significant assets during the divorce proceedings, leading to an unfair division of property. The aggrieved ex-spouse might file a new lawsuit asking the court to reopen or modify the property division portion of the original divorce decree due to this newly discovered fraud. This action constitutes a collateral attack because it's not an appeal of the original divorce judgment, but a separate legal proceeding challenging the validity of a part of that judgment based on a fundamental flaw (fraud) that renders it ineffective or unjust.