Fifth DCA Case: Intended Beneficiaries of Estate Plan May Sue for Legal Malpractice

Can you sue for legal malpractice in Palm Beach County??  What if you were not the party who retained the attorney? The answer may surprise you. Check out what the Fifth District Court of Appeal had to say about the matter in a 2012 case.

Malpractice and Privity of Contract

• When an attorney fails to act properly or forgets to do something, they may be liable for legal malpractice.
• In most cases, a lawyer is only liable to the party who they contract with due to a doctrine called privity of contract.
• In other words if your father sues a company over a slip and fall and loses you cannot sue on the grounds that some of the benefit would have passed to you.
• This is rather convenient in probate matters because usually a client’s family finds outestate documents were not drawn up properly right around the time the only plaintiff dies!
• Did you know this is still the rule in New York, Virginia and Texas!
• Luckily Florida has abolished the need for privity of contract and stated that intended beneficiaries of a contract such as heirs may sue under a traditional lawsuit known as third party beneficiary rights.
• Should Palm Beach probate litigators be liable to future generations?

Hodge v. Cichon

• The Florida Supreme Court a number of years ago abrogated the doctrine of privity of contract.
• In a recent case out of Florida’s Fifth District Court of Appeal individuals who were named as beneficiaries in a few wills executed by a client brought a legal malpractice claim against attorneys who allegedly failed to implement an estate plan that had been designed to reduce estate taxes.
• The trial court dismissed the case but were reversed on appeal.
• The court held that “a limited exception to the privity requirement in the area of will drafting allows an intended beneficiary to file a legal malpractice claim for losses resulting from a lawyer’s actions of in actions where it was the apparent intent of the client to benefit that third party.”
• Do you agree?

Want to learn more? Check out a free copy of the case by clicking here.