SAN FRANCISCO ― In what is sure to be a precedent-setting opinion, the California First District Court of Appeal has affirmed a judgment in favor of a law firm (the Client) represented by Hinshaw. Hinshaw represented the Client for several years in this legal malpractice litigation, winning every issue involving the client along the way.
Briefly, the Client obtained a $7.6 million judgment in a breach of oral contract case and was forced to interplead the recovery when individuals represented by the Client gave conflicting instructions, and the five other entities (four other law firms and a nonlawyer litigation consultant) with contingent interests in the recovery asserted their claims to it. One of the individuals represented by the Client decided that only he should receive any benefit from the recovery and that his former partner, the five law firms and the litigation consultant, should receive nothing. In addition to litigating and confirming the Client’s entitlement to its own contingency interest, Hinshaw also successfully demurred to several successive cross-complaints alleging conversion, legal malpractice and related claims.
The appellate court’s opinion is most significant for its clarification of the pleading requirements for allegations of legal malpractice and its holdings that: interpleading a client's funds is not conversion; there is no right to a jury trial in an interpleader action; accepting a referral from an unauthorized referral service is not a wrong; and asserting a lien, even improperly, does not preclude compensation to an attorney. The Client was represented at trial and on appeal by Ronald E. Mallen and David L. Winnett, Partners in Hinshaw’s San Francisco office.
Hinshaw & Culbertson LLP is a national law firm with 475 lawyers in 25 offices. The firm offers a full-service practice, with an emphasis in litigation, corporate and business law, environmental, labor and employment law, professional liability defense, and wealth preservation and taxation matters. The firm provides services to a range of for-profit and not-for-profit clients in industries that include construction, financial services, health care, insurance, legal, manufacturing, real estate, retail and transportation. Firm clients also include government agencies, municipalities and schools.
Hinshaw was founded in 1934. The firm is headquartered in Chicago, and maintains offices in 12 states:
Arizona,
California,
Florida,
Illinois,
Indiana,
Massachusetts,
Minnesota,
Missouri,
New York,
Oregon,
Rhode Island and
Wisconsin.