Contempt of Court

I'm way confused about what you're trying to do. Depending upon the state, a subpoena is issued by a justice of the peace, attorney, and/or a judge. It cannot be issued by a party in a proceeding, unless the party to the proceeding is authorized independently to issue subpoenas. Usually when I issued a subpoena as a justice of the peace in a legal case, I'd get yelled at rather than my client if the person didn't want to testify.

Remember that the person who issued the subpoena might not be the person who serves the subpoena. Often in New Hampshire we will use the sheriff to serve a subpoena.

Classic contempt is you subpoena a witness to testify on Tuesday, who has something scheduled on Tuesday. Witness doesn't show for the court hearing and you have to request the judge to send a sheriff to force the witness's attendance. Usually the witness will not be a happy camper.

It's hard for a witness to end up with contempt in the courtroom, as the judge will give a lot of wiggle room for the witness to deal with the situation. Usually it will be either lack of respect or refusing to answer a question.

Does this help? As I said, I'm not quite sure what you're trying to do.

Best of luck,

Jim Clark-Dawe

You are not "cited" for contept...you are "held" in contempt.

You do not get to argue--you go to jail.

Do not piss off the judge.

You can be "cited" for contempt of court where the judge issues a citation scheduling a hearing to determine whether you are in contempt of court.

You can be "held" for contempt of court, where the judge has determined that you are in contempt, which can only be done after a hearing. That hearing can be held at the time of the contempt and take about two minutes. However, usually contempt requires a separate hearing.

Best of luck,

Jim Clark-Dawe

If you want the potential witness in trouble in regard to a subpoena, then have him throw a punch or two or three at the server. That probably would get him an assault and battery charge instead of contempt, but it might have the effect that you want.