Our story
You shouldn’t have to face lawsuit abuse alone.
My name is Courtney Ballew. I’m a small-business owner, and I founded the National Center for Legal Integrity because I know what it feels like to watch something your family spent decades building become threatened by the cost of defending it.
Courtney Ballew
Founder, National Center for Legal Integrity
1980
The year my father opened our rink
Where it started
Something that meant far more than a paycheck.
My father opened our roller skating rink in Albuquerque, New Mexico, in January 1980. Today, that rink is Skate-O-Mania.
For more than four decades, it has been a place where children learn to skate, families celebrate birthdays, teenagers find their confidence, and adults rediscover a little of their childhood.
I eventually bought the business from my father, carrying forward something that meant far more to our family than a paycheck.
Part of television history
Skate-O-Mania became Rink-O-Mania.
Filming location: Stranger Things
Our rink even became part of television history when Stranger Things transformed it into Rink-O-Mania. Fans traveled from around the world to see it.
But behind the music, the lights, and the memories, I was dealing with a very different reality.
A very different reality
2,000%
Roughly how many more lawsuits we’ve faced since COVID than in the previous decades
1,100%
How much our insurance premiums increased
Claims multiplied. Insurance costs soared. More of my time and energy went into defending what we had built. The pressure became severe enough that I had to consider whether a business that had served generations of families could keep its doors open.
I had always believed that if you worked hard, treated people fairly, and took responsibility for your decisions, you should have the freedom to build a future.
What shook that belief was discovering how expensive it could be simply to defend yourself.
“The truth should matter more than the cost of defending it.”
Courtney Ballew
What I learned
I’m not an attorney.
My education in the legal system came through running a business, responding to claims, and, at times, defending cases myself.
I learned how
A demand letter can disrupt your life
before a lawsuit is ever filed.
Defending a claim can consume money
you intended to spend on employees, improvements, or expansion.
The stress follows you home
long after the business closes for the night.
The questions that started NCLI
I also began asking questions.
?
If someone makes similar claims against different businesses, who connects the dots?
?
If those claims never reach a public courtroom, how would the next business owner know?
?
How can we understand the problem when so much of the information remains scattered and unseen?
Those questions became the foundation of NCLI.
One business owner’s experience became a reason to bring others together.
I founded the National Center for Legal Integrity to unite business owners and Americans affected by lawsuit abuse, and to turn isolated experiences into information, accountability, and meaningful reform.
Our vision is to build a secure nationwide database that helps connect information from demand letters, legal claims, and court records. With careful research, technology, and professional legal review, we aim to identify patterns that an individual business owner could never see alone.
We want to make useful information easier to understand, give people a stronger collective voice, and advocate for laws that protect legitimate victims while discouraging fraud and abusive claims.
Our standard
That work must be grounded in evidence.
An allegation is not proof. Everyone deserves fairness, including the people whose conduct we examine.
Our principles
Our principles are straightforward.
Truth
Personal responsibility
Fair compensation for genuine harm
Accountability for anyone who abuses the system
We welcome people of every political background who share those values.
What we’re protecting
What we’re working to protect goes far beyond one roller rink.
It is
The restaurant a family spent twenty years building.
It is
The local shop that sponsors a Little League team.
It is
The jobs, gathering places, and opportunities that make a community worth living in.
It is also the confidence to start something new.
Where we are today
NCLI is just beginning.
The database, research network, and broader support operation are goals we are working toward. Membership is free, and voluntary financial support will help us build the resources this mission requires.
“I started this because of what happened to my family’s business. I’m building it for everyone who has felt the same uncertainty—and everyone who deserves a fair chance to build a future.”
Courtney Ballew
Founder, National Center for Legal Integrity
Join us
You shouldn’t have to face lawsuit abuse alone.
Join NCLI for free. Let’s protect what we’ve worked so hard to build.
Join NCLI FreeFree for individuals and businesses. Financial support is always optional.
