If a summons is not served then in some cases the court case or lawsuit case may be dismissed but in some cases the lawsuit may still go through.
Court Papers are usually served by either a process server or a deputy or Sheriff.
In most places a Sheriff's Deputy personally delivers the court papers to the person.
Avoiding being served is not illegal but if you have a court summons being served to you to appear in court and you don't appear in court whether or not you were served with the papers then you can still get into trouble and have a warrant for your arrest.
So always take the papers being served to you to get it over with.
Avoiding being served will just mean that the process server will try over and over again and continue bugging you until you hopefully accept the papers.
Or they may try to serve you through the USPS through certified mail.
If you get sued in court for something and the person suing you wins the lawsuit then the judge orders you to pay up on the lawsuit.
If you have no money then the Judge can put Liens on your house, cars etc or any other property you own and then that can be used to pay the Lawsuit off.
So just because you have no money does not mean that you won't be paying.
The Judge can also attach your salary or take money from your bank account through a court order to pay back the money owed on the Lawsuit.
It's not illegal to avoid being served papers but if you're served with a summons to appear in court and you did not accept the summons then a bench warrant could be issued for your arrest for failure to appear in court.
But the actual refusing to be served in not illegal.
Still you could be sued even without being served as they can still start the lawsuit process.
If you don't appear in court for the lawsuit then it looks bad on you and the person suing you will almost always win the lawsuit against you.
Someone can get a lawsuit against you started without you being served.
However for the actual lawsuit to go through and for yourself to get sued in court you have to be served officially and the papers have to be served to you directly and not mailed to you etc.
A process server or Sheriff will have to show up at your door and serve you with papers.
If you are served and do not show up at court then the person suing you will win the lawsuit by default so if you do get sued then you should show up in court to possibly win the lawsuit.
By law it's not legal for you to be sued without you being served.
So if you were sued without you being served then that is illegal.