Welcome to Batts, Batts & Bell. LLP. We have been serving the needs of business and individuals in Eastern North Carolina since our founding over 25 years ago. Our attorneys and staff share a commitment to excellence and a dedication to serving our clients and our community. Accordingly, we provide sophisticated legal representation to individuals and businesses on a board range of issues and opportunities.We help clients anticipate and avoid problems, resolve disputes, and achieve their business and personal goals. We value our relationship with each client and we dedicate our best resources to each matter in order to arrive at a positive resolution. Each client is served by an attorney with extensive hands-on experience who is supported by a highly skilled staff, ensuring that our clients receive professional and efficient legal representation.Bankruptcy & Debt ReliefWe counsel individuals and small businesses with respect to debt relief and help them obtain such relief including, where appropriate, filing for bankruptcy under Chapter 7 or Chapter 13 of the Federal Bankruptcy Code. Under Chapter 7, which is available to both individuals and businesses, assets are liquidated and all discharge-able debts are discharged. Under Chapter 13, individuals, or small proprietary business owners, with regular income develop a plan to repay all or part of their debts while creditors are forbidden from starting or continuing collection efforts.Our attorneys and support staff will help you through this difficult process by explaining how bankruptcy works, and what will be required for your specific case, including advising you how much it will cost you from beginning to end and how long the process will take to conclude. Please call use today for a confidential and no-cost consultation.Family LawFamily law issues usually arise in the context of divorce proceedings. However, family law encompasses a wide array of topics and situations such as: establishing the paternity of a child, terminating the parental rights of a parent, adoption, seeking protection from domestic violence, prosecuting a claim for alienation of affection, and executing separation, prenuptial, or post-nuptial agreements.Family law issues rarely involve a single aspect of the law. Often, numerous aspects of family law are involved in a given situation. For example, when a couple decides to terminate their marriage, one of the parties will petition the court for a divorce. Besides seeking a legal termination of the relationship, the couple may also ask the court to divide the marital assets via equitable distribution, grant child custody to one or both parents, and impose child and spousal support obligations, if applicable. Partner, Joe Bell, and associate, Mike Smith, can assist you with most family law issues implicated by your unique situation.Additionally, family law issues such as divorce and equitable distribution are often intertwined with other areas of the law. For example, if you have a large marital estate which includes a family business, stock options, or shares in a "closely held" corporation, evaluating your fair share of the marital estate during equitable distribution may be complicated and require special expertise in the areas of corporate law and tax law. Our firm is uniquely positioned to provide representation in such a situation.