Case ID: ad_93/html/0552-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Willard Bartlett, J.:", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

In the Matter of the Appeal of Gustavus A. Rogers, the Defendant’s Attorney in the Case of Israel Pomeranz, Plaintiff, v. Louis Marcus, Defendant. Gustavus A. Rogers, Appellant, v. Israel Pomeranz and Louis Marcus, Respondents.
    
      Attorney and client — when a settlement of an action by a client will not be carried out by the court — marking a case as settled is a discontinuance. >
    
    The right of the parties to an action to settle the litigation does not require the court to carry into effect a settlement made for the purpose of, depriving the defendant’s attorney of his costs.
    In such a case a discontinuance of the action will he refused except upon terms which will protect the attorney.
    The action of a trial judge in marking a case settled is equivalent to a discontinuance of the action.
    Appeal by Gustavus A. Rogers, the defendant’s attorney in the first above-entitled action and the plaintiff in the second above-entitled action, from an order of the Supreme Court in the former action, made at the Kings County Trial Term and entered in the office of the clerk of the county of Kings on the 16th day of April, 1903, denying a motion made by the said Gustavus A. Rogers to restore that case to the day calendar “ for the purpose of protecting the rights of the defendant’s attorney herein, and for the purpose of determining his right to the taxable costs of this action.”
    
      Gustavus A. Rogers, appellant, in person.
    
      Maxwell G. Cohen, for the respondent Pomeranz.
   Willard Bartlett, J.:

This case was before the Appellate Division in July last, when the appeal was dismissed because the attorney who claimed to be aggrieved by the order appealed from was not the appellant. (Pomeranz v. Marcus, 86 App. Div. 821.) ■ The attorney has now appealed, and we think that he is entitled to a reversal of the order upon the authority of the case of National Exhibition Co. v. Crane (167 N. Y. 505). The allegation in the moving affidavit, that the settlement between the parties was collusive for the purpose of defrauding the defendant’s attorney of his costs, was not denied. As was said on the previous appeal, the action of the trial judge in marking the case settled was equivalent to a discontinuance of the action. In view of the uncontradicted allegation that ^/the settlement was collusive and fraudulent, a discontinuance should not, have been granted without protecting the defendant’s attorney. We do not question the right of parties to settle their cases, which is so strongly asserted by the learned trial judge in his opinion ; but under the doctrine of the Crane case, above cited, this right does not extend so far as to compel the court to carry the settlement of a litigation into effect where it is made for the purpose of depriving an attorney of his costs.

The order appealed from should be reversed and the case restored to the calendar at Trial Term. When it is duly called for trial, if the parties show the court that a settlement has been effected without collusion for the purpose of depriving the defendant’s attorney of his costs, they will be entitled to an order of discontinuance. If, on the other hand, it appears that the settlement was collusive and fraudulent, a discontinuance may be refused, except upon terms which will protect the attorney for the defendant.

All concurred.

Order reversed, with ten dollars costs and disbursements.