Dear Friends,
Here is a squib from today's NJLJ Daily Briefing on an App Div case upholding summary judgment in a legal mal case involving a family lawyer and failure to include a reconciliation clause. Altho the decision favored the defense, it should remind us to expect the unexpected in our cases and settlement agreements, and to include contingencies like reconciliation, no matter how unlikely it may seem.
We can save ourselves many headaches "proactively", and this is a prime example of why we should do that.
See below for details:
LEGAL PROFESSION - ATTORNEY MALPRACTICE
04-2-4113 McDonald v. Munson , App. Div. (per curiam) (13 pp.) Plaintiff, who had retained defendant-attorney to represent her when she initially filed a divorce complaint and again when she reinstituted proceedings after a reconciliation failed, appeals the grant of summary judgment dismissing her legal malpractice complaint against defendant and her law firm. Plaintiff alleged that defendant had negligently represented her by failing to include a clause in the initial PSA stating that it would survive reconciliation and negligently omitting from the 2003 PSA the fact that plaintiff owned an interest in a piece of real property. The panel affirms, finding that plaintiff's expert rendered a net opinion when analyzing plaintiff's claims of negligence and was properly excluded, and that without such expert proof, no reasonable jury could have found negligence. It also says that the expert's opinion that a reconciliation provision was legally enforceable is mere speculation, unsupported by the record or any authority, and that at the time of reconciliation, the record suggests the entire agreement remained executory and the parties did not express an intent to preserve the PSA. Therefore, the PSA was likely abrogated when the parties resumed their marital relationship.
-------------------------------------------
Hanan Isaacs Esq.
Kingston NJ
(609)683-7400
-------------------------------------------