Justia Professional Malpractice & Ethics Opinion Summaries

Barbara Roberts sued Steve Lanier and his firm Steve Lanier, PC, and Rodney Stallings and his firm Coggin & Stallings, LLC. In 2006, Ms. Roberts was arrested on murder charges and sent to the Cherokee County jail. She contacted Attorney Lanier, who then met with her and agreed to represent her in her criminal proceedings. The contract between them provided that Ms. Roberts would pay a "nonrefundable retainer" of $50,000. At that time, Ms. Roberts executed a power-of-attorney authorizing Mr. Lanier to withdraw the retainer from her bank accounts. Ms. Roberts testified at trial that she first learned that Mr. Lanier was not licensed to practice law in Alabama when she appeared for her first hearing at the district court. It was then that she was introduced to Mr. Stallings, who "associated" on her case. Seeing no need for two lawyers, she tried to terminate Mr. Lanier's representation. Mr. Stallings eventually managed Ms. Roberts' case, having all her mail sent to his office so that he could "oversee every aspect" of her personal life, including payment of all outstanding bills and expenses. Ms. Roberts alleged that instead of using her money for the purposes she intended, Mr. Stallings misappropriated approximately $100,000 of her funds. Ms. Roberts was eventually convicted of capital murder and sentenced to life without parole. She later learned that the "nonrefundable retainer" language in her contract with Mr. Lanier was unenforceable under Alabama law, and sued her former lawyers for legal malpractice. The circuit court granted summary judgment to the lawyers. Upon review, the Supreme Court reversed the circuit court's grant of summary judgment in favor of the lawyers only with respect to employment contract and the "nonrefundable retainer" and the misappropriation of Ms. Roberts' money for expenses while she awaited trial. The Court remanded the case for further proceedings.

Petitioner filed suit against respondent for breach of contract and breach of fiduciary duty. Respondent had been employed by petitioner since 1983 and rose to become a managing director. In 2005, respondent signed a Non-Solicitation Agreement and notice form stating that he wanted to exercise a stock option to acquire 3000 shares of stock of petitioner's parent company. At issue was whether a covenant not to compete signed by a valued employee in consideration for stock options, designed to give the employee a greater stake in the company's performance, was unenforceable as a matter of law because the stock options did not give rise to an interest in restraining competition. The court held that, under the terms of the Covenants Not to Compete Act (Act), Tex. Bus. & Com. Code 15.50, 52, the consideration for the noncompete agreement (stock options) was reasonably related to the company's interest in protecting its goodwill, a business interest the Act recognized as worthy of protection. Therefore, the noncompete was not unenforceable on that basis. Accordingly, the court reversed the court of appeal's judgment and remanded to the trial court for further proceedings.

Plaintiffs Michael Ashby and Randy O'Brien, inmates at the state department of correction, asserted professional malpractice complaints against attorney C. Bruce Davidson to The Bar Plan Mutual Insurance Company, Davidson's professional liability carrier. Bar Plan then intervened in consolidated actions for damages filed on behalf of plaintiffs against Davidson, asserting a cross-claim that it was not obligated to indemnify Davidson for the claims of plaintiffs because Davidson had failed to notify Bar Plan of any claims against him pursuant to Bar Plan's policy. The trial court granted summary judgment to Bar Plan. The Supreme Court held that Davidson's failure to comply with Bar Plan's policy was not dispositive because plaintiffs opposed summary judgment on grounds of waiver and estoppel. The Court then reversed summary judgment, holding that genuine issues of fact remained regarding whether Bar Plan's misrepresentation of valid coverage resulted in plaintiffs sustaining actual detriment. Remanded.

Plaintiff filed a complaint for breach of fiduciary duty, professional negligence, and breach of contract against defendants, an attorney and his law firm, where the attorney agreed to represent plaintiff in its effort to obtain approval of a redevelopment project, the attorney terminated the representation about two years later, and then the attorney became involved in a campaign to thwart the same redevelopment project by soliciting signatures on a referendum petition to overturn the city council's approval of the project. At issue was whether the court of appeals properly found that plaintiff's claims arose from protected activity in violation of the anti-strategic lawsuit against public participation ("anti-SLAPP") statute, Code Civ. Proc., 425.16, and whether plaintiff had failed to demonstrate a probability of prevailing on them. The court reversed the court of appeals and held that, based on the respective showings of the parties, plaintiff's claims for breach of fiduciary duty, professional negligence, and breach of contract possessed at least minimal merit within the meaning of the anti-SLAP statute.

Appellants appealed an order revoking their pro hac vice admissions in connection with a putative class action suit where the suit alleged that appellants' clients breached supplemental cancer insurance policies that they had issued. At issue was whether the district court erred in revoking appellants' pro hac vice status where the revocation was based on motions appellants filed in response to plaintiffs' request for class certification, chiefly a motion to recuse the district judge based on his comments during an earlier hearing. The court vacated the revocation order and held that, even though the recusal motion had little merit, the district court erred in revoking appellants' pro hac vice admissions where it did not afford them even rudimentary process.

The Supreme Court reviewed the appellate courtâs decision against Plaintiffs Jack and Danette Steele. In their claim, Plaintiffs alleged that attorney Katherine Allen gave them incorrect information about a statute of limitations, which led to missing a filing deadline in a negligence suit. The trial court dismissed both their claims of negligent misrepresentation and professional negligence. Plaintiffs only appealed the dismissal of their negligent misrepresentation claim. The appellate court held that Plaintiffs had a claim against the attorney. However, the Supreme Court disagreed, finding that Plaintiffsâ evidence was not sufficient to support their claim. The Court reversed the decision of the appellate court and remanded the case for further proceedings.

In 2001, a company calling itself âComputer Geeks, a California corporation,â sued Plaintiff Jason Wright in Utah state court for failing to assign a domain name. Mr. Wright did not respond to the companyâs motion for summary judgment, and in 2006, the state court granted the motion and entered judgment against him. Mr. Wright hired Appellant-Attorney Russell Cline to have the judgment set aside or modified. In 2008, Appellant filed a motion to set the judgment aside. As it turns out, âComputer Geeks, a California corporationâ is not related to the company that held the Utah state judgment. Appellant was made aware of the mistaken identity soon after Appellant served âComputer Geeks, a California corporation.â Appellant represented to the clerk of the district court that he had properly served âComputer Geeks, a California corporation.â The clerk entered a default, and Appellant moved for a default judgment. Within a few weeks, Defendant CompGeeks.com moved to vacate the default judgment. At the hearing, Appellant acknowledged he knew the difference between the two companies, but that he served the correct holder of the Utah judgment. The district court found that Appellant had filed a frivolous action in violation of state law, and dismissed the case. The court referred Appellant to the state attorney disciplinary committee, and awarded attorneyâs fees to CompGeeks.com, making Mr. Wright and Appellant jointly and severally liable for the award. Appellant moved to vacate the award of attorneyâs fees, alleging the district court abused its discretion in its decision. On review, the Tenth Circuit âsympathize[d] with the district courtâs frustration with [Appellantâs] conduct,â but held that â Rule 11 does not allow a sua sponte award of attorney fees.â Accordingly the monetary sanctions order was vacated, and the Court remanded the case for further proceedings.