Summons
When a party (person, corporation or other legal entity) is notified that legal action is being taken against him/her, s/he is issued a summons by the court. The aptly-named summons is a document that states the names of both plaintiff and defendant, the title (name) and file number of the case (i.e., "Smith v. Jones, Docket No. 1234546") the address of the court in which proceedings are to take place, and the name and address of the plaintiff's attorney.
In addition, a summons contains instructions to the defendant on how to file a response to the complaint as well as the deadline for doing so - which is usually 30 days from the time the defendant receives it. For this reason, when there are multiple defendants it is necessary for copies to be served to each one at the same time.
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Should the defendant fail to respond to the summons or appear in court, the judge will summarily rule in favor of the plaintiff.
In the U.S., a summons may be issued by a court clerk or an attorney, depending on the statutes of a particular state.
If you have ever received a traffic citation, you probably noticed that somewhere at the top were the words "Notice To Appear." This is another type of summons. You were served on the scene by the officer who stopped you and required to either (A) pay a fine by a certain date, or (B) appear in court on a certain time and day if you wished to contest the citation. Failure to do either would have resulted in charges being filed against you and a warrant issued for your arrest.
A third type of summons is called an administrative summons. This is an order to appear before a representative of a government agency, such as the Internal Revenue Service or the Environmental Protection Agency. Failure to respond to such a summons can result in criminal penalties, such as a monetary fine and imprisonment.