Case Title: Brooks v. Zebre

Citation: 

Docket Number: 

State: wyoming

Court: Wyoming Supreme Court

Date: 1990-05-17T00:00:00Z

Document:
Brooks v. Zebre1990 WY 52792 P.2d 196Case Number: 88-263Decided: 05/17/1990Supreme Court of Wyoming
PATRICIA A. BROOKS AND FIRST INTERSTATE BANK, N.A., CASPER, 
CO-TRUSTEES OF THE BROOKS MARITAL TRUST,

 APPELLANTS 
(PLAINTIFFS),

v.

JOHN A. ZEBRE, D/B/A JOHN 
A. ZEBRE, P.C., A WYOMING CORPORATION,

 APPELLEE (DEFENDANT).

Appeal from the District 
Court, Sweetwater County, Kenneth G. Hamm, J.

Wesley A. 
Roberts and Donald P. White of White, White & Keenan, P.C., Riverton, for 
appellants.

W.W. Reeves of 
Reeves & Murdock, Casper, for appellee. 

Before 
CARDINE, C.J., THOMAS, URBIGKIT, and MACY, JJ., and ROONEY, J., 
Retired.

THOMAS, Justice.

[¶1]      In this case, we 
address the question of whether John A. Zebre, a practicing attorney d/b/a John 
A. Zebre, P.C. (Zebre), owed a duty to Patricia A. Brooks (Brooks) and First 
Interstate Bank, N.A., Casper (Bank), the co-trustees of the Brooks marital 
trust, who were not clients of Zebre. The claims against Zebre had their genesis 
in his representation of members of the Arambel family in connection with a 
contract to lease, and an option to purchase, a ranch. Zebre's clients were the 
lessees and optionees under the contract. The claims against Zebre are asserted 
by Brooks and the Bank, with Brooks being the lessor and grantor of the option 
under the contract while acting as the personal representative of the estate of 
her deceased husband. After the contract was rescinded by the court because it 
was found to be unconscionable, Brooks and the Bank sought damages from Zebre. 
In the assertion of the claim for damages, theories of negligence, gross 
negligence, and fraud were pleaded. The district court granted a summary 
judgment to Zebre on the ground that no duty was owed by Zebre to Brooks that 
would permit recovery under the theories of negligence or gross negligence and 
on the ground that there was no fraud demonstrated on the record. We affirm the 
grant of summary judgment by the district court.

[¶2]      In the 
Appellants' Brief, Brooks and the Bank submit the following statement of 
issues:

"1. Does an attorney owe 
a duty to a non-client who he knows to be represented by an attorney when he 
undertakes to conduct negotiations, advises both parties as to the legal 
consequences of the transaction, and presides over the execution and closing of 
the transaction?

"2. Is there a genuine 
issue as to any material fact so as to preclude Summary Judgment as a matter of 
law in this case?

"3. Assuming, arguendo, 
that there exists no genuine issue as to any material fact, could reasonable 
minds reach different conclusions from those undisputed facts on the issues of 
negligence, gross negligence and fraud so as to preclude Summary Judgment as a 
matter of law?"

Those issues 
then are afforded additional substance by the Summary of Argument, which we 
quote:

"I. Zebre owed a duty to 
the Brooks estate, and the heirs thereof, in connection with the lease and 
option to sell the Brooks Ranch, notwithstanding the absence of privity between 
them, because; 

"A. The ethical duty 
imposed on attorneys in Wyoming by the Code of Professional Responsibility 
creates a legal duty and a legal standard of care.

"B. Zebre was not only 
acting as an attorney, but was performing functions of a real estate agent or 
broker in closing the Brooks Ranch transaction and should be held to at least 
that legal standard of care imposed upon the real estate profession.

"C. Zebre's conduct, when 
considered under the `balancing of factors' test established in recent court 
decisions, clearly gives rise to an independent duty of care to the Brooks 
estate and the heirs thereof.

"D. Once Zebre spoke to 
the issue of imputed interest, he thereafter had a duty to make a full and fair 
disclosure thereof.

"II. The district court 
erred in granting summary judgment because there exist genuine issues as to 
material facts in this case.

"III. Assuming, arguendo, 
that there exist no genuine issues as to any material facts, the district court 
erred in granting summary judgment because reasonable minds could reach 
different conclusions and inferences from the undisputed facts on the issues of 
negligence, gross negligence and fraud on the part of Zebre."

In the Brief of 
Appellee, John A. Zebre, the issues are articulated in this fashion:

"1. Whether current 
theories which impose liability on an attorney for harm to non-clients resulting 
from the attorney's negligence in performing professional services for a client, 
can apply where the non-client had interests adverse to those of the attorney's 
client and where the legal services were performed to the client's 
satisfaction;

"2. Whether violation of 
ethical rules of conduct adopted by the Supreme Court creates a private right of 
action, where no right of action for the conduct complained of otherwise 
exists;

"3. Whether appellants 
have adequately plead and established in the evidence a viable claim of 
fraud;

"4. Whether appellants' 
claims of fraud have been conclusively adjudicated against it, that is, may 
appellants maintain an action against Mr. Zebre on the contention that he 
participated in his client's scheme to defraud, when appellants tried and lost 
the same fraud claims against the clients; and

"5. Whether having 
obtained the equitable remedy of rescission and restitution from Mr. Zebre's 
clients, appellants may now use the same facts to pursue a claim for the legal 
remedy of damages against the lawyer, Zebre."

In a Reply Brief 
of Appellants, the issues are not expanded, but the following Summary of 
Argument is submitted in response to points raised in the brief of the 
appellee:

"I. There is no issue of 
judicial estoppel in this case.

"II. Claims for fraud 
have never been litigated in this matter, and, therefore, appellants cannot be 
foreclosed from litigating those claims now.

"III. Appellants are 
entitled to recover damages that are a direct and proximate result of Mr. 
Zebre's tortious conduct."

[¶3]      This dispute 
centers upon the lease of a ranch in Sweetwater County that included an option 
to purchase. The ranch, a viable livestock raising enterprise, was developed by 
Isaac Brooks who died in the spring of 1983, leaving a substantial estate that 
included the ranch. Isaac Brooks's wife, Patricia, was appointed the personal 
representative of the estate, and she, of course, was among the heirs. In 
addition to his wife, Isaac Brooks was survived by their four natural children 
and a daughter of Mrs. Brooks whom Isaac had adopted. One son was in quite 
delicate health, having already had a colostomy and a brain shunt at a 
relatively early age.

[¶4]      About two months 
after Isaac Brooks's death, members of the Arambel family, neighbors and 
long-time friends, began a series of almost daily visits with Mrs. Brooks. In 
the course of these visits, she expressed an interest in leasing the ranch. She 
also manifested an overriding concern for the future of her ill son. The record 
demonstrates that the additional duties required of her as personal 
representative, which included management of the ranch, when added to her usual 
responsibilities as the mother of five young children, created an extremely 
difficult burden for Brooks, who had not received much formal education and had 
little business experience. She exhibited indications of stress including 
drinking as much as a case of beer per day.

[¶5]      Not long after 
she expressed an interest in leasing the ranch, the Arambels arranged a meeting 
with Brooks in the law offices of Zebre for the purpose of discussing and 
arranging a possible lease. Zebre was acquainted with Brooks, and the record 
discloses he visited in her home during Isaac Brooks's last illness. At that 
time, he reviewed Isaac Brooks's will, in her presence, and offered some 
suggestions as to improvement of the dispositive scheme. Despite this earlier 
acquaintance, however, and despite whatever knowledge Zebre possessed of the 
Isaac Brooks will and estate, there is no question on the part of any party that 
Zebre represented only the Arambels.

[¶6]      At the meeting in 
Zebre's office, Brooks advised him that another attorney was handling the 
probate of the estate of her deceased husband, and she suggested to all who were 
present that the estate attorney be involved in the negotiations. Later, she 
testified that, in response to this suggestion, John Arambel told her, "[y]ou 
don't need to talk to [the attorney] because he won't let you do it because he 
wants all the money." She further testified that Zebre said to her, "[d]on't 
tell [the attorney] because he'll just tell you not to lease that ranch." Zebre 
claims to have made several attempts to contact the attorney for the Brooks 
estate, but the record does not demonstrate that any contact ever was made or 
that the estate attorney was informed of these matters until after all 
negotiations had been completed and the agreement had been executed. The meeting 
at which the contract provisions were agreed upon was conducted with neither 
Brooks, nor her children, nor the estate being represented by an attorney or any 
other person knowledgeable in either business or law.

[¶7]      This meeting, 
which lasted about an hour, is exemplified only by reports of the conversation. 
No records were kept, and no documents were reviewed, discussed, or created. The 
parties testified that Mike Zebre, Zebre's brother, was summoned to the meeting 
at one point to explain the tax consequences of the imputation of interest by 
the Internal Revenue Service with respect to periodic payments that did not 
include an interest factor. Brooks asked no questions of Mike Zebre although he 
admitted in his deposition that he, in fact, did give her advice.

[¶8]      Brooks's 
testimony with respect to this meeting was that she was not able to comprehend 
much of the discussion. Her recollections of the meeting, and the discussion 
relating to the lease and the option, were extremely vague. She testified that 
she did not remember any conversation concerning an option to purchase the 
ranch, a forty-year lease, a sale of all the cattle and sheep, or other 
essential terms and conditions of the agreement finally reached. Zebre recalls, 
on the other hand, that Brooks was "very poised, confident" and that "she was 
very certain and very positive, confident about what she was there about, what 
was happening."

[¶9]      Following the 
meeting, Zebre prepared the contract encompassing the lease, the option, and the 
sale of livestock as well as the other aspects of the agreement reached at the 
meeting in his office. On the next day, Brooks and the Arambels again met at 
Zebre's office and proceeded to review, for the first and only time, the 
proposed contract, the drafting of which was attributable to the joint efforts 
of Zebre and the Arambels. Zebre asserts that he did attempt to reach the 
attorney for the Brooks estate at that time, but was unsuccessful. Even though 
he was unable to contact the other attorney, he returned to the conference room 
and presided over the execution of the agreement, assuring Brooks, all the 
while, that he was going to get in touch with the attorney for the estate the 
first thing the following Monday morning to make sure that the attorney had 
appropriate copies of everything. Zebre did follow through, and he delivered 
fully executed copy of the agreement to the attorney for the estate, demanding 
that the attorney seek court confirmation of the transaction because the 
property still was involved in the probate proceedings. Upon his review of the 
agreement, the attorney for the estate recommended to Brooks that she return any 
consideration she already had received and that she seek rescission of the 
contract. Brooks did not, at that time, follow through on that 
advice.

[¶10]   Subsequently, an action was 
instituted by the Arambels for a declaration of their rights under the 
agreement. Brooks and the estate counterclaimed for rescission of the contract, 
and they caused Zebre to be named as a "third-party defendant." The product of 
that action was that the court ruled that the agreement was unconscionable and 
ordered rescission and appropriate restitution. The claims against Zebre were 
not resolved at that time. Later, all parties agreed to a mutually satisfactory 
arrangement to settle the matter except for the claims against Zebre. Zebre then 
moved for, and was granted, a summary judgment by the court. This appeal is 
taken by Brooks and the Bank, claiming that the district court erred in granting 
summary judgment because Zebre, even though representing the Arambels, is 
responsible for damages on the tort theories of negligence, gross negligence, 
and fraud.

[¶11]   In order to recover for negligence 
or gross negligence, the plaintiff is required to demonstrate all necessary 
elements of the tort including the element of a legal duty owed by the defendant 
to the plaintiff. Guinand v. Atlantic Richfield Company, 485 F.2d 414 (10th Cir. 
1973); Thomas by Thomas v. South Cheyenne Water and Sewer District, 702 P.2d 1303 (Wyo. 1985); Hughes v. Housley, 599 P.2d 1250 (Utah 1979). The issue of 
whether a duty is owed is strictly a question of law. McClellan v. Tottenhoff, 
666 P.2d 408 (Wyo. 1983); Moewes v. Farmer's Insurance Group, 641 P.2d 740 (Wyo. 
1982); Distad v. Cubin, 633 P.2d 167 (Wyo. 1981); Medlock v. Van Wagner, 625 P.2d 207 (Wyo. 1981); Beard v. Brown, 616 P.2d 726 (Wyo. 1980); Maxted v. 
Pacific Car and Foundry Company, 527 P.2d 832 (Wyo. 1974). With respect to 
questions of law, we do not defer to the decision of the lower court. Matter of 
North Laramie Land Company, 605 P.2d 367 (Wyo. 1980). When we determine, 
however, that no legal duty exists from a defendant to the plaintiff, a summary 
judgment with respect to claims of negligence is appropriate and must be 
affirmed. See Fiscus v. Atlantic Richfield Company, 773 P.2d 158 (Wyo. 1989); 
Matter of Larsen, 770 P.2d 1089 (Wyo. 1989); Farr v. Link, 746 P.2d 431 (Wyo. 
1987); Johnson v. Soulis, 542 P.2d 867 (Wyo. 1975).

[¶12]   From the record, it is indisputable 
that Zebre owed his professional duty to the Arambels. They were his clients, 
and an attorney assumes the very highest of duties with respect to zealous 
representation of his clients. Sowerwine v. Nielson, 671 P.2d 295 (Wyo. 1983). 
Brooks's interests with respect to the transaction were adverse to those of the 
Arambels, and it is fundamental that Zebre could not have assumed a duty to 
Brooks without violating his primary duty to the Arambels. Hughes. The situation 
emphasizes scriptural wisdom. "No servant can serve two masters. For he will 
either hate the one and love the other, or he will cling to the one and despise 
the other." Luke 16:13 (Richmond Lattimore Translation). In this instance, there 
is no suggestion of any dissatisfaction by the Arambels with Zebre's services, 
nor do they claim that he was negligent in performing his duties to them or that 
he provided anything less than entirely exemplary service on their 
behalf.

[¶13]   Brooks does not claim that Zebre 
was representing her or that he was negligent in performing his services for the 
Arambels. Brooks and the Bank insist that Zebre was directly negligent in 
his treatment of Brooks as an adverse party. A specific allusion is made with 
respect to advice concerning the imputed interest rules of the Internal Revenue 
Service.

[¶14]   Brooks and the Bank premise their 
contentions upon precedent from other jurisdictions. Having considered those 
asserted authorities carefully, we agree with the district court and hold that 
an attorney owes no actionable duty to an adverse party emanating from the 
zealous representation of his own client. Friedman v. Dozorc, 412 Mich. 1, 312 N.W.2d 585 (1981). Cf. Chicago Title Insurance Company v. Holt, 36 N.C. App. 
284, 244 S.E.2d 177 (1978) (claims of attorney malpractice or negligence 
generally sound in contract law and not in tort). Any infringement upon this 
proposition, in our judgment, results in an irreconcilable conflict of interest 
working extreme violence to the adversarial process as we know it. See Friedman. 
Because it is undisputed in the record that Zebre was representing only the 
Arambels, Brooks and the Bank present no genuine issue of material fact germane 
to this rule. Consequently, the claims of negligence and gross negligence 
against Zebre must fail, as a matter of law, and the summary judgment as to 
those issues must be affirmed.

[¶15]   Cases which apparently have 
followed the balancing rule articulated in Biakanja v. Irving, 49 Cal. 2d 647, 
320 P.2d 16 (1958), are distinguishable because the facts in those instances 
assume a third-party beneficiary whom the client clearly intended to favor by 
employing the services of the attorney. Even so, not all jurisdictions have 
opted to follow the suggestion of Biakanja. See, e.g., Simon v. Zipperstein, 32 
Ohio St.3d 74, 512 N.E.2d 636 (1987). The rule with respect to attorneys 
representing buyers of real property is that no duty is owed to a seller. Fox v. 
Pollack, 181 Cal. App. 3d 954, 226 Cal. Rptr. 532 (1986); Clause v. Manuel, 442 So. 2d 905 (La. App. 1983), cert. denied 448 So. 2d 106 (La. 1984). Cases from a 
number of jurisdictions invoking the rule of privity are cited in Annotation, 
Attorney's Liability, to One Other Than Immediate Client, for Negligence in 
Connection with Legal Duties, 61 A.L.R. 4th 615 (1988), § 8 at 634. In the same 
Annotation, § 9 at 645, authorities are cited establishing the proposition that 
no cause of action for negligence exists against an attorney for an 
adversary.

[¶16]   We turn then to the contention of 
Brooks and the Bank that they are entitled to a cause of action arising out of 
an asserted violation of the rules adopted by this court relating to ethical 
conduct of attorneys. The clear rule is that no private cause of action in favor 
of a non-client can be found attributable to violations of the disciplinary 
rules relating to attorneys. Brody v. Ruby, 267 N.W.2d 902 (Iowa 1978); Hill v. 
Willmott, 561 S.W.2d 331 (Ky.App. 1978); Spencer v. Burglass, 337 So. 2d 596 (La. 
App. 1976), cert. denied 340 So. 2d 990 (La. 1977); Friedman; Drago v. 
Buonagurio, 46 N.Y.2d 778, 413 N.Y.S.2d 910, 386 N.E.2d 821 (1978). Cf. Hawkins 
v. King County, Department of Rehabilitative Services, Division of Involuntary 
Treatment Services, 24 Wn. App. 338, 602 P.2d 361 (1979) (duty of zealous 
representation of a client's interest overriding unsupported claim of ethical 
violation). We hold that no claim will lie on behalf of Brooks and the Bank 
founded upon any violation of the disciplinary rules relating to 
attorneys.

[¶17]   A contention also is present that 
Zebre was performing the functions of a real estate agent, or broker, and should 
be held to the legal standard of care imposed upon that profession. In our view, 
the only basis for liability against Zebre is his conduct in his professional 
role as an attorney, and the rules relating to the conduct of real estate 
brokers and agents have no pertinency here. While the record seems clear that 
Zebre, through his brother, did offer information with respect to the imputed 
interest rules of the IRS, we can discern no way in which that information would 
be material to this dispute in light of the fact that the transaction was 
rescinded. That advice, good or bad, could not have had any impact upon the 
rights of Brooks or the Bank.

[¶18]   In addition to the negligence 
claims, Brooks and the Bank claim that fraud was perpetrated on them by Zebre. 
This claim also is appropriately disposed of as a matter of law on summary 
judgment because Brooks and the Bank do not provide anything other than 
conclusive allegations to support their claim. Despite numerous contentions of 
wrongdoing, Brooks and the Bank are not able to establish on the record any 
actual misrepresentations or statements allegedly made by Zebre with knowledge 
that they were false and with the intent that Brooks should rely upon them. The 
omission is fatal in an instance such as this because our rule is that claims of 
fraud must be plead with particularity. Rule 9(b), W.R.C.P.; Johnson v. Aetna 
Casualty & Surety Company of Hartford, 608 P.2d 1299 (Wyo. 1980), cert. 
denied 454 U.S. 1118, 102 S. Ct. 961, 71 L. Ed. 2d 105 (1981), reh. denied 455 U.S. 1039, 102 S. Ct. 1743, 72 L. Ed. 2d 157 (1982).

[¶19]   It well may have been more 
appropriate to dispose of this aspect of the case by granting a dismissal to 
Zebre. Nevertheless, in light of this record, we address it in the context of a 
summary judgment. While we are reluctant to decide a matter on anything other 
than the merits, we have recognized that the entire beneficial purpose of a 
summary judgment could be defeated if cases could be forced to unnecessary trial 
by the mere assertion that a genuine issue of material fact exists. Fiscus, 773 P.2d 158; Noonan v. Texaco, Inc., 713 P.2d 160 (Wyo. 1986); Johnson; Maxted, 527 P.2d 832. When the movant for summary judgment has made a prima facie showing 
entitling him to relief, as Zebre did in this case by demonstrating to the court 
that there were no specific allegations of fraud, the burden must shift to the 
party opposing the motion to present admissible evidence of material facts 
sufficient to refute the prima facie showing. Connaghan v. Eighty-Eight Oil 
Company, 750 P.2d 1321 (Wyo. 1988). In this instance, without regard to the 
admissibility of the evidence presented, Brooks and the Bank have failed to 
assert any facts necessary to establish the elements justifying a cause of 
action for fraud. Consequently, the district court correctly granted summary 
judgment as to this claim as a matter of law.

[¶20]   Since the record, and the law, 
establish that no legal duty flowed from Zebre to Brooks in this instance, the 
claims for recovery for negligence and gross negligence must fail. Furthermore, 
in the absence of any evidence of fraud, the claim of Brooks and the Bank to 
recover for fraud must fail. We affirm the summary judgment entered by the trial 
court in Zebre's favor.

URBIGKIT, J., files a dissenting 
opinion.

URBIGKIT, Justice, 
dissenting.

[¶21]   I regretfully but strongly dissent. 
The result of this holding permits predation by an attorney so long as the 
defrauded victim is not a client. I am unconvinced by the majority's rationale 
that any other result would do "extreme violence to the adversarial process." 
This fraud did not occur within the context of an adversarial process and I find 
such an explanation misplaced. It is non-adversarial if only one attorney 
directs the events. Flaherty v. Weinberg, 303 Md. 116, 492 A.2d 618 
(1985).

[¶22]   John Arambel appeared to be close 
friends of Isaac and Patricia Brooks. The Arambels and the Brooks were 
neighboring ranchers. When Isaac Brooks died, John Arambel and his son Peter 
found use for John Zebre and his license to practice law. The three joined 
together and quickly convinced the recently widowed Patricia Brooks to sign an 
agreement after repeatedly advising her not to consult her attorney before she 
signed. Whether disoriented by grief or blinded by the trust of old friends 
during a time of enormous personal pain and anxiety, Patricia Brooks signed an 
agreement she should never have signed. That agreement essentially gave away the 
ranch.

[¶23]   In short order, the Arambels 
scurried to district court for a declaration of their rights against Patricia 
Brooks under that agreement. Patricia Brooks and First Interstate Bank, N.A., 
Casper, Wyoming counterclaimed to rescind the contract and named Zebre as a 
third-party defendant for damages from gross negligence and fraud. The district 
court judge granted summary judgment to Zebre but rescinded the agreement as 
wholly unconscionable and issued a scathing twenty-three page decision letter. 
For purposes of summary judgment, it is assumed that Zebre willfully violated 
fundamental rules of professional conduct adopted by the Wyoming Supreme Court. 
Today, this court holds that Zebre owed absolutely no duty to Patricia Brooks 
and that she did not plead her complaint of fraud with sufficient 
particularity.1

[¶24]   The rationale which underpins this 
holding is that to permit "any infringement" on the proposition that an attorney 
owes no actionable duty to an adverse party would work an "extreme violence to 
the adversarial process." The solution here is mismatched with the rationale 
because this case does not involve the adversarial process. If protecting the 
adversarial process was at stake, I would join readily with the 
majority.

[¶25]   I cannot accept the majority's 
rationale that: (1) the duty to zealously represent a client frees an attorney 
from any actionable duty to others; (2) willfully violating the rule for 
professional responsibility by negotiating directly with another attorney's 
client, to the detriment of that client, creates no cause of action for the 
harmed individual; and (3) Brooks did not "assert any facts necessary to 
establish the elements justifying a cause of action for fraud." Giving all 
reasonable inferences to the non-moving party when reviewing a grant of summary 
judgment, it is not unreasonable to infer that fraud permeated the entire 
transaction. A newly widowed woman and her children were cheated out of their 
inheritance when Zebre, an attorney, succeeded in convincing her to rely on his 
advice and to not consult the attorney for her husband's estate before signing 
what was later declared an unconscionable agreement.2

I.

BACKGROUND

[¶26]   After rescinding the unconscionable 
contract, the pertinent portion of the district court judge's twenty-three page 
decision letter stated:

     Let us consider, as 
briefly as possible, the facts. Pat Brooks, the personal representative, is the 
widow of Isaac N. Brooks who, having been in ill health since 1978, suffering 
from a heart condition, diabetes, high blood pressure, prostate trouble, and had 
been bedfast for a year, during which time his wife took care of him. He 
ultimately died on March 29, 1983. He was survived by his wife, four natural 
children, and his wife's daughter whom he had adopted. At the time of his death 
he was the owner of a sheep and cattle ranch, some city real estate and personal 
property. Mrs. Brooks' son, Richard Goetacher died suddenly in 1981. Her son, 
Isaac Brooks, Jr., then 13 and 14 when the contract was signed, and probably 
still 14 on the date of the trial, was and is in poor health, having undergone 
thirteen operations, including a colostomy and a brain shunt. After Mr. Brooks' 
death, his wife had thrust upon her the duty of running a fairly large livestock 
company, aided by a manager who had worked for Mr. Brooks for 43 years. In 
addition, she still had five children, ranging in age from 10 to 17, and 
attempting to manage the city property along with the other assets of the estate 
ranging from corporate stocks, bank accounts, motor vehicles and her home. Her 
educational background was sparse, having quit high school in the 10th grade, 
and her business background even more meager as all she ever worked at was 
packing frozen dinners and as a waitress which she was when she married Mr. 
Brooks who was about 25 years her senior. She was not involved in the operation 
of the business, as that was handled by Mr. Brooks, nor involved in the 
bookkeeping or the preparation of tax returns. Sometime after her husband's 
death, she began drinking about a case of beer a day.

     John and Peter Arambel, on 
the other hand, have been in the livestock business all of their lives. John is 
a high school graduate, a bank director for 25 years, has served on the Bridger 
Teton Advisory Board for about six years, counselor/agent for the French 
government, served as an FHA Livestock Inspector covering five Wyoming counties 
for five years, has been an ASC, has served on the FHA Loan Board, and was a 
director of the BLM for sixteen years, has reviewed government policies with 
regard to public lands and a member of the ASGA, which is similar to the FHA. He 
has been involved in the sale of at least ten ranches as a dealer, and is the 
owner with his sons of at least five livestock companies. He testified he was a 
lifelong friend of Mr. Brooks, who was the closest friend he ever had, and he 
knew that Mrs. Brooks had confidence in him.

      Peter Arambel is a 
high school graduate, has attended Colorado State University for 3 1/2 years, 
majoring in Pre-Veterinary Medicine, Natural Science and Agricultural Business, 
and has been in the livestock business since his school days.

      After Mr. Brooks 
died, John Arambel attended the funeral, and then on July 24, 1983, paid her a 
courtesy call at which time he apparently learned that she was contemplating a 
sale of the Brooks ranch to the Rock Springs Grazing Association. This disturbed 
him because, as I gather from the testimony, he was afraid the RSGA would deny 
him access to some of his own holdings to his detriment. He asked her what she 
wanted for the ranch and she told him Mr. Brooks said it was worth 4 1/2 million 
dollars, and that is what she wanted. He said he could not pay that, but he 
would talk to his sons. Then on August 1, 1983, he told her he wanted the ranch 
and on August 2, 1983, he and Peter discussed with her alone the terms. He 
testified he was aware of Isaac Brooks, Jr.'s physical condition; that he knew 
of the Brooks' special concern for Isaac Brooks, Jr. and of his physical 
condition; and he testified he made no allowances for the fact that Mrs. Brooks 
was recently widowed and had no real business experience. John Arambel also 
testified that he and Peter arranged a 40-52 year pay period but knew Mrs. 
Brooks was thinking of a cash sale. He also testified that he developed the 
$2,000.00 per A.U.M. figure but never discussed it with her; that he told her 
that Isaac, Jr. would be a partner with the Arambels and in his deposition he 
proposed Isaac, Jr. would become an immediate partner on an equal basis; that he 
had told Isaac Brooks, Sr. that he would take care of young Isaac; and he 
further testified that what he told Mrs. Brooks really meant nothing - it was 
only what the contract said that mattered. 

      Peter Arambel 
testified he and his father John told Mrs. Brooks it had to be a long term deal; 
and that they discussed the deal with her; and also they talked about splitting 
costs with Issac, Jr. as partners; and that Mrs. Brooks was concerned about 
Issac, Jr.[]

      After the meetings 
with Mrs. Brooks, and after a lapse of about nine days, things moved with 
uncommon swiftness. John Arambel called John Zebre at 6:00 A.M. on August 11, 
1983, and Zebre met with John and Peter at 1:00 P.M.[] Shortly thereafter, Mrs. 
Brooks and her daughter Kathy, then age 14, appeared at Zebre's office and there 
was discussion about the terms of the lease which was to be a long term, and 
apparently about the contract also. Mrs. Brooks was adamant about young Isaac's 
position but when discussion ended, his position was unclear. The Arambels and 
Zebre all testified, in one way or another, that Mrs. Brooks appeared poised and 
confident, and not intoxicated, depressed or confused. Since the contract called 
for no interest, Mike Zebre explained "imputed interest" to the parties. He did 
not explain in dollar figures the tax consequences of such imputed interest to 
any of the parties. The Arambels and John Zebre said Mrs. Brooks said she didn't 
believe in interest and "Screw the IRS and I'll get around this" or words to 
that effect. John Zebre also testified that Issac, Jr. would become a partner if 
he exercised his option at age 19 or within three years thereafter, to run his 
retained 500 A.U.M.'s in common with the Arambels, or upon such areas as they 
might designate. Although Mrs. Brooks testified John Arambel and John Zebre told 
her not to talk to her attorney, Galen West, as he would tell her not to lease 
the ranch, they both denied that. Further, Mrs. Brooks testified that no 
discussion was had of a sale, long term lease, option, interest, disposition of 
500 A.U.M.'s, but the Arambels and Zebre all testified to the 
contrary.

     The next day, on August 12, 
1983, John Arambel again called John Zebre at 6:00 A.M. and asked him to meet 
the Arambels at their accountant's office at 7:00 A.M., which he did. Mrs. 
Brooks was not there, nor was she invited. Peter Arambel showed Zebre part of 
the deal which reserved 500 A.U.M.'s to Isaac, Jr. which permitted him to run 
his livestock to that extent in common with the Arambels, or upon such area as 
they might designate, if he exercised his option to do so when he reached age 19 
or within three years thereafter, and that Isaac, Jr. would become a partner 
with the Arambels when he exercised the option. John Zebre went to his office to 
prepare the agreement and thereafter, about 4:00 P.M. according to Zebre, the 
Arambels arrived at his office, followed shortly by Mrs. Brooks and then Saima 
McCurtain, one of the trustees with Mrs. Brooks. Although the testimony is 
conflicting as to when everyone arrived at Zebre's office on the 12th, it is 
evident they did eventually. Also, there is conflicting testimony as to what 
further discussion was had concerning the contract, I have little doubt that the 
essential portions were read to the parties. Although Zebre had tried to call 
West on both the 11th and 12th, knowing he was Mrs. Brooks' attorney, he 
permitted her to sign the contract without letting her have her attorney examine 
it first, or even advising her to see her attorney. She never saw the contract 
before the 12th. The contract, by the way, was actually prepared by the Arambels 
by piecing together portions of contracts prepared by their former attorney 
before his retirement, with the addition of a few portions they developed 
themselves, and Zebre merely put it in the finished form. Zebre further 
testified that the Arambels had wanted the entire matter completed on the 11th, 
and said that Mrs. Brooks wanted it done also, but did not say when. John 
Arambel was then "insistent" that it be done as soon as possible. It is to be 
noted that throughout her entire testimony, Mrs. Brooks always referred to the 
contract as the "lease." The contract was signed and Mrs. Brooks was given a 
check for $50,000.00 dollars. 

     The district court then discussed the 
contract and what was wrong with it in sixteen numbered paragraphs3 of which paragraph 12 stated:

     Mrs. Brooks had no 
professional advice of any kind. She discussed the matter with her children, her 
brother, Mrs. McCurtain and Mr. Smith. None of them knew any more than she did 
about the legal effects of the contract. Mr. Smith knew the manual aspect of 
operating a ranch, but nothing of the legal aspects.

[¶27]   A settlement between the Arambels and 
the Brooks estate resulted in a significant depletion of the estate. Only claims 
against Zebre remain in this appeal.

II.

STANDARD OF REVIEWB            

[¶28]   Because the district court judge 
rescinded the contract and granted summary judgment or Zebre regarding the 
claims against him, we are left in this review with events which are 
established, events which are contested, and pleadings. Under the standard of 
review for summary judgment, all reasonable inferences are to be given the 
non-moving party, which in this case is Patricia Brooks and the bank. Davenport 
v. Epperly, 744 P.2d 1110 (Wyo. 1987); 
Cordova v. Gosar, 719 P.2d 625 (Wyo. 1986). If the decision is authenticated under W.R.C.P. 12(b)(6), a 
separate principle of any arguable allegation is invoked.4 Fiscus v. 
Atlantic Richfield Co., 742 P.2d 198, 202 (Wyo. 1987); Torrey v. Twiford, 713 P.2d 1160 (Wyo. 1986). 
See also Riggs Nat. Bank of Washington, D.C. v. Freeman, 682 F. Supp. 519 
(S.D.Fla. 1988), where a motion to dismiss was improvidently granted in a suit 
by the lender against the attorney without any attorney-client relationship by 
holding in disregard of a special confidence which the attorney had created.

[¶29]   This record presents an unconscionable 
contract negotiated by the attorney for the buyer in the absence of the attorney 
for the estate - to have been accomplished after Patricia Brooks, the personal 
representative/co-trustee to the estate, relied upon Zebre's advice to ignore 
her own attorney. The transaction resulted in significant damages to the 
defrauded estate even after the contract was rescinded.

1. 
It is established that the contract was 
unconscionable.

2. 
It is established that the contract prepared in 
Zebre's office was negotiated in the presence of Zebre. After the contract was 
executed, Zebre delivered a copy to Galen West, the attorney for the Brooks 
estate who was the attorney Zebre had advised Patricia Brooks not to consult. 
First contact with opposing counsel was when Zebre advised West of the fait 
accompli.

3. 
It is established that Zebre intentionally did what 
he did in direct violation of explicit rules of conduct for attorneys adopted by 
the Wyoming Supreme Court.

4. 
Despite dispute about what, if anything, Zebre did to contact the attorney for 
the Brooks estate, there is no dispute that no contact was made before 
negotiating a final agreement with Patricia Brooks. Furthermore, under the summary judgment standard of review, the 
appellant's version of the facts are accepted as true.

5. 
What was said by Zebre to Patricia Brooks or to the co-trustee about legal 
advice from their attorney as the attorney of the estate is in conflict in the 
record. Under the summary judgment standard of review, 
the appellant's version of the facts are accepted as true.

6. 
Damages to the estate are not in dispute. The extent and significance of the 
damage is in conflict. Under the summary judgment 
standard of review, the appellant's version of the facts are accepted as 
true.

III.

SUMMARY OF ARGUMENT TO BE PRESENTED

[¶30]   In dealing with the perspective of our 
standard of review for the summary judgment disposition of this case, including 
its aspects of fraud, overreaching and ethical misconduct, it is helpful to 
outline what claims were made by the widow and the estate and the evidence 
considered when summary judgment was granted. The majority fails to relate the 
lack of casualness in Zebre's conduct portrayed by the record. If we must 
provide another blanket of civil immunity, it is only fitting and proper that we 
make clear we understand what it is we are protecting. Patricia Brooks stated in 
her answer and counterclaim:

      23. That by 
undertaking the activities mentioned in paragraph 22, Third-Party Defendant 
ZEBRE owed a duty not only to his clients, JOHN F. ARAMBEL and PETER R. ARAMBEL, 
but also owed a duty to these Defendant/Third-Party Plaintiffs to perform said 
activities in a proper, skillful, and diligent manner as would reasonably be 
expected of attorneys similarly situated.

     24. By his acts and 
omissions, Third-Party Defendant ZEBRE breached the duties owed to Defendant 
Third-Party Plaintiffs and such negligence includes, but is not limited to, the 
following:

A. 
ZEBRE failed to advise Defendant/Third-Party Plaintiffs that he could not 
represent the competing and conflicting interest of the ARAMBELS and the 
interest of these Defendant/Third-Party Plaintiffs.

B. 
ZEBRE failed to advise Defendant/Third Party Plaintiffs that their execution of 
the Memorandum Contract could result in the imposition of substantial 
liabilities for breach of Defendants/Counterclaimants' fiduciary 
duties.

C. 
ZEBRE failed to advise Defendant/Third-Party Plaintiffs of substantial tax 
liabilities which will result from the imposition of imputed interest on 
payments pursuant to the Memorandum Contract.

D. 
ZEBRE failed to advise Defendant/Third-Party Plaintiffs to seek independent 
counsel when ZEBRE learned that the attorney for the estate was out of 
town.

E. 
ZEBRE failed to advise as both his clients and Defendant/Third-Party Plaintiffs 
that execution of the Memorandum Contract should be postponed when it became 
apparent that Defendant/Third-Party Plaintiffs were not represented by 
counsel.

F. 
ZEBRE failed to read and explain the entire contract to Defendant/Third-Party 
Plaintiffs before obtaining their signature thereon.

G. 
ZEBRE failed to advise Defendant/Third-Party Plaintiffs that the estate's shares 
of the Rock Springs Grazing Association would ultimately be transferred to the 
ownership of his clients if the option was exercised pursuant to the Memorandum 
Contract.

H. 
ZEBRE failed to advise Defendant/Third-Party Plaintiffs that the selling price 
for the ranch properties was only a small fraction of the market value of same 
when payments were made on 40-year or 52-year basis pursuant to said Memorandum 
Contract.

25. 
That ZEBRE owed the foregoing duties which were breached by him to these 
Defendant/Third-Party Plaintiffs because of special circumstances, including but 
not limited to the following:

A. 
ZEBRE had previously done legal work for the Brooks family prior to the death of 
ISAAC N. BROOKS.

B. 
ZEBRE had personally visited PATRICIA BROOKS at her home and personally 
contacted her during the negotiations leading up to the execution of the 
Memorandum Contract, although ZEBRE knew or should have known that the estate 
was represented by an attorney.

C. 
ZEBRE is related by marriage to JOHN F. ARAMBEL and PETER R. 
ARAMBEL.

[¶31]   In an amended cross-claim and 
third-party complaint, in view of the suggestion of the majority that 
consideration as a motion to dismiss might be appropriate, the claims were 
expanded and amplified:

     COMES NOW the Defendants 
and Third-Party Plaintiffs, Patricia A. Brooks and Saima McCurtain, and for 
their Amended Crossclaim and Third-Party Complaint against John A. Zebre, dba 
John A. Zebre, a Professional Corporation, allege and state as 
follows:

NEGLIGENCE

[¶32]   1. Defendant/Third-Party Plaintiffs 
reallege the allegations contained in Paragraphs 1 through 19 of the 
Counterclaim against the Arambels previously filed herein and incorporate them 
herein by this reference as if fully set forth.

[¶33]   2. Third-Party Defendant, JOHN A. 
ZEBRE, is, and at all times pertinent herein, was an attorney at law duly 
licensed to practice in the State of Wyoming. Third-Party Defendant is and was 
at all perti[n]ent times herein a resident of Sweetwater County, Wyoming.

[¶34]   3. That, prior to August 12, 1983, JOHN 
[A.] ZEBRE, was employed by JOHN F. ARAMBEL and PETER R. ARAMBEL to represent 
them in the negotiations with PATRICIA A. BROOKS. That JOHN A. ZEBRE undertook 
to conduct negotiations, prepare documents, advise the parties to the Memorandum 
Contract and to preside over the execution of the Memorandum Contract on August 
12, 1983.

[¶35]   4. That, by undertaking the activities 
mentioned in Paragraph 22, Third-Party Defendant ZEBRE owed a duty not only to 
his clients, JOHN F. ARAMBEL and PETER R. ARAMBEL, but also owed a duty to these 
Defendant/Third-Party Plaintiffs to perform said activities in a proper, 
skillful, and diligent manner as would reasonably be expected of attorneys 
similarly situated.

[¶36]   5. By his acts and omissions, 
Third-Party Defendant ZEBRE breached the duties owed to Defendant/Third-Party 
Plaintiffs and such negligence includes, but is not limited to, the 
following:

     (a) ZEBRE failed to advise 
Defendant/Third-Party Plaintiffs that he could not represent the competing and 
conflicting interest of the ARAMBELS and the interests of these 
Defendant/Third-Party Plaintiffs.

     (b) ZEBRE failed to advise 
Defendant/Third-Party Plaintiffs that their execution of the Memorandum Contract 
would result in the imposition of substantial liabilities for breach of 
Defendants/Counterclaimants' fiduciary duties.

     (c) ZEBRE failed to advise 
Defendant/Third-Party Plaintiffs of substantial tax liabilities which will 
result from the imposition of imputed interest on payments pursuant to the 
Memorandum Contract.

      (d) ZEBRE failed to 
advise Defendant/Third-Party Plaintiffs to seek independent counsel when ZEBRE 
learned that the attorney for the estate was out of town.

      (e) ZEBRE failed to 
advise both his clients and Defendant/Third-Party Plaintiffs that execution of 
the Memorandum Contract should be postponed when it became apparent that 
Defendant/Third-Party Plaintiffs were not represented by counsel.

      (f) ZEBRE failed to 
read and explain the entire Contract to Defendant/Third-Party Plaintiffs before 
obtaining their signature thereon.

     (g) ZEBRE failed to advise 
Defendant/Third-Party Plaintiffs that the estate's shares of the Rock Springs 
Grazing Association would ultimately be transferred to the ownership of his 
clients, if the option was exercised pursuant to the Memorandum 
Contract.

      (h) ZEBRE failed to 
advise Defendant/Third-Party Plaintiffs that the selling price for the ranch 
properties was only a small fraction of the market value of same when payments 
were made on a 40-year or 52-year basis pursuant to said Memorandum 
Contract.

[¶37]   6. That ZEBRE owed the foregoing duties 
which were breached by him to these Defendant/Third-Party Plaintiffs because of 
special circumstances, including but not limited to, the following:

     (a) ZEBRE had previously 
done legal work for the Brooks family prior to the death of ISAAC N. 
BROOKS.

     (b) ZEBRE had personally 
visited PATRICIA BROOKS at her home and personally contacted her during the 
negotiations leading up to the execution of the Memorandum Contract, although 
ZEBRE knew or should have known that the estate was represented by an 
attorney.

     (c) ZEBRE is related by 
marriage to JOHN F. ARAMBEL and PETER R. ARAMBEL.

GROSS NEGLIGENCE

7. 
Defendant/Third-Party Plaintiffs reallege the allegations contained in 
Paragraphs 1 through 6 of the Crossclaim and Third-Party Complaint and 
incorporate them herein by reference as if fully set forth.

8. 
ZEBRE has been grossly negligent and ZEBRE's entire course of conduct in regard 
to BROOKS and McCURTAIN has been in bad faith, is outrageous, and evinces a 
wanton, willful, reckless and wrongful disregard for the rights and interests of 
these Third-Party Plaintiffs, and as such, entitles Third-Party Plaintiffs to 
recover punitive and exemplary damages from ZEBRE in an amount to be determined 
at trial.

THIRD-PARTY BENEFICIARIES

9. 
Defendants/Third-Party Plaintiffs reallege the allegations contained in 
Paragraphs 1 through 8 of their Crossclaim and Third-Party Complaint against 
ZEBRE heretofore filed herein and incorporate them herein by this reference as 
if fully set forth.

10. 
ZEBRE knew, or should have known, that Defendants/Third-Party Plaintiffs entered 
into the Memorandum Contract for the benefit of the heirs of ISAAC N. BROOKS, 
deceased, and for the benefit of the beneficiaries of the Testamentary Trusts 
established by the Last Will and Testament of the late ISAAC N. BROOKS, namely: 
PATRICIA A. BROOKS, ELIZABETH BROOKS KAUMO, KATHY ANN BROOKS, ISAAC N. BROOKS, 
JR., IDA JENNIE BROOKS and SAIMA BROOKS, and the damages described in Paragraph 
15 below would be sustained by said heirs and said Trust beneficiaries. 

FRAUD

11. 
Defendants/Third-Party Plaintiffs reallege the allegations contained in 
Paragraphs 1 through 10 of their Crossclaim and Third-Party Company against 
ZEBRE heretofore filed herein and incorporate them herein by this reference as 
if fully set forth.

12. 
In addition to undertaking the activities mentioned in Paragraph 22 of the 
Crossclaim and Third-Party Complaint, and commit[t]ing the acts and omissions 
enumerated in Paragraph 24 of the Crossclaim and Third-Party Complaint, ZEBRE 
violated DR 7-104(A)(1) when he communicated with Patricia A. Brooks about the 
Memorandum Contract when he knew, or should have known, she and the Brooks 
Estate were represented by Galen West, an attorney-at-law, practicing in Rock 
Springs, Wyoming.

13. 
ZEBRE further violated DR 7-104-(A)(2) when he gave legal advice, other than to 
secure counsel, to Patricia A. Brooks on August 11, 1983 and on August 12, 1983 
when he knew that there was a reasonable possibility that the interests of 
Patricia A. Brooks and the Brooks Estate would be in conflict with the interests 
of his clients, John F. Arambel and Peter R. Arambel.

14. 
In rendering legal advice to Patricia A. Brooks, ZEBRE commit[t]ed the following 
specific fraudulent acts and omissions:

      (a) On August 11, 
1983, at his law office while meeting with the Arambels and Patricia A. Brooks 
and while discussing terms and conditions of the proposed Memorandum Contract, 
he called his brother, MICHAEL ZEBRE, into the meeting on the pretext of 
explaining the tax consequences of not including interest in an installment 
sales agreement.

     (b) ZEBRE and his brother 
purposely failed to fully disclose the adverse effect that imputed interest 
would have upon the interests of Patricia A. Brooks and the Brooks Estate heirs 
as sellers, in the Memorandum Contract.

     (c) On August 12, 1983 at 
approximately 7:00 o'clock, A.M., ZEBRE and the ARAMBELS met with LES HENDERSON, 
a Certified Public Accountant, who explained the tax consequences of imputed 
interest as it would relate to the proposed Memorandum Contract.

     (d) On August 12, 1983, 
ZEBRE met with PATRICIA A. BROOKS, SAIMA McCURTAIN and the ARAMBELS at his law 
office and conducted the closing of the sale of the Brooks Ranch property and 
witnessed the execution of the Memorandum Contract. At said closing, he 
purposely and intentionally failed to make another disclosure of the tax 
consequences of imputed interest to PATRICIA A. BROOKS and SAIMA 
McCURTAIN.

     (e) On August 11, 1983, at 
the meeting described in Paragraph 5(a) above, ZEBRE purported to render legal 
advice to PATRICIA A. BROOKS and represented to her that his brother, who is a 
graduate accountant and a practicing attorney in the State of Wyoming, would be 
able to render competent advice with respect to the tax consequences to the 
imputed interest, knowing that PATRICIA A. BROOKS would rely upon such advice. 
On August 12, 1983, ZEBRE, after having discussed the tax consequences of 
imputed interest with a Certified Public Accountant, purposely and intentionally 
withheld the full explanation thereof from PATRICIA A. BROOKS and SAIMA 
McCURTAIN prior to and at the execution of the Memorandum Contract.

     (f) PATRICIA A. BROOKS 
justifiably relied upon the representations made to her by ZEBRE and his brother 
on August 11, 1983 and since no further disclosures were made regarding the 
consequences of imputed interest on August 12, 1983, she and SAIMA McCURTAIN did 
execute the Memorandum Contact.

15. 
As a direct and proximate cause of the negligence, gross negligence and 
fraudulent acts of ZEBRE and of his failing to fully disclose the tax 
consequences of imputed interest to PATRICIA A. BROOKS and SAIMA McCURTAIN prior 
to the execution of the Memorandum Contract, PATRICIA A. BROOKS and the BROOKS' 
HEIRS have suffered the following damages:

     (a) Attorneys' fees and 
costs in successfully having the Memorandum Contract set aside in the sum of 
$83,292.01.

     (b) Loss of the use, rents 
and profits of the cattle, sheep, farm vehicles, machinery and equipment [of] 
the BROOKS RANCH from the date of the execution of the Memorandum Contract to 
the date said Contract was set aside.

     (c) The loss of the 
opportunity to sell the BROOKS RANCH in the amount of $1,100,000.

     (d) Restitution required to 
be paid to the ARAMBELS by Court Order in the sum of $440,000.

     (e) Other cost and expenses 
in an amount to be proved at trial.

The 
history between the families was related in Patricia Brooks' brief:

     For over two generations 
there was a close relationship between the Arambels and Isaac N. Brooks. John 
Arambel and Ike Brooks grew up together, were neighboring ranchers and lived one 
block from each other in Rock Springs, Wyoming. John Arambel considered Ike 
Brooks to be his closest friend. * * *

     Zebre, who is related to 
the Arambels by marriage, also was well acquainted with Ike and Pat Brooks. * * 
* In November of 1982, Zebre visited Ike Brooks at his home during his last 
illness. During that visit Zebre reviewed Ike's Will in the presence of Pat 
Brooks. Zebre told them that he saw potential tax problems with the Will, as 
drafted at that time, in terms of tax consequences that would occur at such time 
as Ike would pass away. Zebre suggested a more detailed review of the Will and 
the possible use of other estate planning vehicles such as a series of trusts. A 
subsequent meeting between Pat Brooks and Zebre at his law office was discussed. 
Several days later Zebre called Pat Brooks to arrange for an office appointment. 
No further estate planning discussion or meetings were held because Pat Brooks 
was preoccupied with her husband's deteriorating health. * * *

     On March 29, 1983, Isaac N. 
Brooks died. On April 15, 1983, the Last Will and Testament of Isaac N. Brooks 
was admitted to Probate in the District Court of Sweetwater County, Wyoming in 
Probate No. P-83-32 * * *. Patricia A. Brooks, widow of the decedent, was 
appointed Personal Representative of said Estate. * * *

* * 
* * * *

     The principal asset of the 
Brooks Estate was a complete working ranch located in Sweetwater County, 
Wyoming. The Brooks Ranch consisted of the following real and personal 
property:

Appraisal 

* * 
* 

Item

Deeded land, shares of common stock of the Rock Springs 
Grazing Association, grazing and agricultural leases and permits issued by the 
State of Wyoming, U.S. Bureau of Land Management, and Union Pacific Land 
Resources Corporation                                  
$2,100,000 

Cattle and sheep                                                                                           
$ 830,831

Vehicles, trailers, tractors, motorized implements other 
implements, bailers and mowers, corrals and wire, household items, power tools 
and motors, and tanks and wagons         112,222          

          
TOTAL $3,043,053

EARLY NEGOTIATIONS

     In the latter part of May, 
1983, approximately two months after the death of Isaac N. Brooks, the Arambels 
began a series of frequent, almost daily, visits with Mrs. Brooks at her home or 
by telephone, which continued through the first part of August, 1983. * * * 
During these visits and conversations, Mrs. Brooks expressed an interest in 
leasing the Brooks Ranch. She communicated her concern to the Arambels about the 
future of Isaac N. Brooks, Jr. She indicated her desire to keep the minerals for 
her daughters. She was definite about retaining the Rock Springs Grazing 
Association Stock for her son. She told Arambels she thought the Brooks Ranch 
operation was worth 4.5 million dollars. * * *

Mrs. 
Brooks testified at the trial as to what happened next as a result of the 
Arambel visits:

"Well, they just kept coming and telling me what they were 
going to do for Newt and how they were going to help me out, and that my kids 
and that could go out there and we could and stay at the summer ranch anytime we 
wanted to. . . . Well, I just decided I thought I would lease it to them because 
I felt I could trust John. I didn't know who else I could trust. And so I 
decided that I would lease it to him, and then they called me to Zebre's 
office." * * *

FIRST MEETING AT ZEBRE'S OFFICE

A 
meeting was held in Zebre's law office on August 11, 1983. Those persons in 
attendance were John Zebre, John Arambel, Sr., Peter Arambel, Pat Brooks and her 
daughter, Kathy Brooks. * * * Zebre, who was related by marriage to John 
Arambel, represented the Arambels throughout this transaction. * * * At the 
outset of the meeting, Pat Brooks advised Zebre that Galen West, a local Rock 
Springs attorney, was handling the probate of her deceased husband's estate, and 
that the will being probated was a new and different will than the one Zebre 
reviewed for Ike Brooks at his home in November, 1982. * * * Zebre, at this 
point in the meeting, claims that he attempted to call Galen West. He stated 
that he was informed that Mr. West was not in his office, he left word for Mr. 
West to return his call, but that he did not talk to Galen West that day. * * * 
Pat Brooks suggested to Zebre that Mr. West be involved in the negotiations. * * 
* In response to this suggestion, John Arambel told her, "You don't need to talk 
to Galen West because he won't let you do it because he wants all the money". 
She further states that Zebre told her, "Don't tell Galen [West] because he'll 
just tell you not to lease that ranch". * * *

In 
all events, the meeting held in Zebre's law office on August 11, 1983 proceeded 
without West or any other attorney representing Pat Brooks, the Brooks children, 
or the Brooks Estate.

The 
entire meeting, which lasted about one hour, consisted of oral conversations. 
There were no minutes or records of the meeting taken, and there were no drafts 
of any agreements or other documents reviewed or discussed at the meeting. Mrs. 
Brooks testified that she did not understand all of what was being discussed. * 
* * Her recollection of the nature and contents of the matters discussed at the 
meeting were extremely vague. She stated that she could recall no discussions 
about an option to purchase the ranch, about a forty year lease, about a sale of 
all the cattle and sheep, and other essential terms and conditions of the final 
agreement. * * *

* * 
* * * *

Zebre, however, recalls that Mrs. Brooks was "very poised, 
confident", and that "she was very certain and very positive, confident about 
what she was there about, what was happening." * * * He further recalled with 
great detail and specificity the items discussed at the meeting. He stated that 
"some terms were dictated to me by Mrs. Brooks, some terms were dictated to me 
by Arambels". * * * Zebre recalls that one of the matters discussed was the 
question of interest. * * *

* * 
* * * *

At 
this point Michael Zebre entered the meeting at the request of his brother, John 
Zebre. Mike Zebre has impressive credentials as a graduate accountant, a lawyer, 
a licensed real estate salesman, IRS tax practitioner, and a CPA candidate. * * 
* Mike Zebre recalls his participation in the meeting as follows: 

"I 
was buzzed on the phone and John asked me to come in and answer a question about 
imputed interest." * * *

He 
then stated:

"I 
said that if anyone doesn't include - generally, if one doesn't have 9% interest 
in a contract the IRS will impute 10% interest. And I believe that I said after 
that that some portion of whatever payments Mrs. Brooks would receive would be 
considered interest income. . . . I expressed that that would be an adverse type 
of thing to have the IRS do to someone. . . . I said that instead of it being a 
principle reduction it would be interest income." * * *

Mike 
Zebre further recalls that he was in the meeting approximately five to ten 
minutes, he did not give any examples of the consequences of imputed interest, 
and no one in the meeting, including Mrs. Brooks, asked any questions of him. * 
* * Mike Zebre did not advise Mrs. Brooks to talk to an attorney or to talk to 
an accountant about imputed interest. * * * Mike Zebre freely admits that he was 
called into the meeting by his brother, John Zebre, for the purpose of giving 
advice and explaining the tax consequences of imputed interest. He stated in his 
deposition as follows:

"Q. 
You did in fact give her advice, though, didn't you?

A. 
Yes." * * *

IV.

LEGAL MALPRACTICE

A. 
Duty of Zealous Representation

[¶38]   The majority notes that Brooks and the 
bank "premise their contentions upon precedent from other jurisdictions." That 
is a curious notation while we watch the majority itself reach out for precedent 
from other jurisdictions to justify this remarkable decision. Whatever else may 
be said, the result in this case cannot be said to be driven by Wyoming 
precedent. It is driven by something else.

[¶39]   The majority looks to Friedman v. 
Dozorc, 412 Mich. 1, 312 N.W.2d 585 (1981) as the flagship case for its 
rationale. I agree with both the holding and rationale in Friedman, but I am 
perplexed how either the holding or rationale applies here. The plaintiff in 
Friedman argued an attorney has a duty to "conduct a reasonable investigation 
and re-examination of the facts and law" before initiating a civil suit. Id. 312 N.W.2d  at 589. Even the Friedman defendants said they would have allowed 
liability in the presence of fraud or collusion. Id. at 590. The suit here would 
not chill the vigor necessary to the adversarial system since Patricia Brooks 
and the bank are not suing because of actions by an opposing attorney in a civil 
suit. Reliance on Friedman is misplaced.

[¶40]   It should be recognized that no case as 
egregious as this has been found where civil immunity has been provided for 
misconduct under the mantle of zealous advocacy.5 See 
Annotation, Attorney's Liability, To One Other Than Immediate Client, For 
Negligence in Connection With Legal Duties, 61 A.L.R.4th 615 (1988); Annotation, 
What Constitutes Negligence Sufficient to Render Attorney Liable to Person Other 
Than Immediate Client, 61 A.L.R.4th 464 (1988); Annotation, Attorney's 
Liability, To One Other Than His Immediate Client, For Consequences of 
Negligence in Carrying Out Legal Duties, 45 A.L.R.3d 1181 (1972). Zebre used his 
legal license to commit a fraud not only on a recently widowed, unsophisticated 
individual, but on the court system and the minor heirs who had a direct 
interest. This fraud was accomplished by excluding the estate attorney who could 
have provided some usable information. The estate attorney described his 
consternation and anger in detail at trial as he described his initial 
interviews with the defrauded widow:

     Q. Now, in your meetings on 
August 15th with Mrs. Brooks and August 19th, I think you said on direct 
examination that you expressed to her what you thought the contract, the present 
value of that contract, was worth?

     A. Yes.

     Q. Could you tell us what 
you told her?

     A. I told her that I 
thought it was worth - that I couldn't tell her exactly how much `cause, you 
know, there were some calculations that had to be done, but I thought it was 
worth considerably less [than] a million dollars.

     Q. And at that time, of 
course, there wasn't an appraisal in the estate; but did you have any idea what 
the property was worth, what the ranch was worth?

     A. Yes.

     Q. Could you tell us what 
that was?

     A. What I was afraid it was 
worth was about five million dollars.

     Q. At that 
time?

     A. Yes.

     Q. Did you tell her 
that?

     A. Oh, yes.

     Q. So you said, "You're 
selling a five-million-dollar ranch for a million-dollar contract."

     A. Right.

[¶41]   The majority allows the notion of 
privity to drive this result and ignores a pre-eminence of Wyoming's ethical 
standards for legal conduct. We could and should do better if the public respect 
we seek for the legal profession is to be achieved.

[T]o 
the extent that disciplinary violations go unpunished, the application of 
codified ethical standards in legal malpractice proceedings may be an additional 
deterrent against unethical conduct. In fact, in some cases, a monetary penalty 
in civil litigation may be a more meaningful sanction than a private admonition 
or reprimand in the disciplinary system.

Hoover, The Model Rules of Professional Conduct and Lawyer 
Malpractice Actions: The Gap Between Code and Common Law Narrows, 22 New 
Eng.L.Rev. 595, 616 (1988).

[¶42]   The basis for 
defining this case is the admitted and accepted violation of one of the 
fundamental tenants of legal practice: "You do not negotiate ex parte with 
another lawyer's client."6 "Hoffman's Resolution XLIII was: `I will never 
enter into any conversation with my opponent's client relative to his claim or 
defense, except with the consent and in the presence of his counsel.'" H. 
Drinker, Legal Ethics 201 (1953) (emphasis added).

[¶43]   A further meeting was held the next 
morning at 7:00 a.m. attended by the Arambels and Zebre with their accountant in 
order, apparently, to again discuss the advice that had been furnished to 
Patricia Brooks regarding imputed interest. The information obtained was never 
revealed to her nor the fact that the meeting had ever been held until developed 
in litigative discovery many months later.

[¶44]   Zebre claimed that as he left the 
accountant's office on August 12, 1983, he called the law office of the estate 
attorney, Galen West, who was not in, and then went to the house of West's 
client, the widow Patricia Brooks, and picked up a copy of the will and returned 
to his office to prepare the sales agreement to be signed at 4:00 p.m. that 
afternoon.

[¶45]   The confused and befuddled widow was 
called back into a meeting at 4:00 p.m. that afternoon without contact having 
been made by Zebre with the estate attorney or advice provided that negotiations 
were underway. The sales agreement was signed and before the transaction got 
unscrambled twenty-six months later, the estate and the heirs had sustained 
losses and damages of at least $1.83 million from costs, losses and delay and 
litigative expenses.

[¶46]   The "acquisition" of the Brooks Ranch 
by the Arambels was treated for tax purposes, as it was, as a purchase on 
partnership tax returns. Contrasted with the listed $3.5 million value shown on 
the transaction agreement document, the Arambels provided a realistic valuation 
for tax purposes on the partnership income tax return. For the 1984 tax return, 
as the first annual period, prepared but not filed after acquisition, including 
livestock sales of $116,369 with a "cost" of $55,440, the purchasers capitalized 
the ranch acquisition as: machinery $25,070.14; trucks $16,475.47; breeding herd 
cattle $305,664.29; breeding herd sheep $169,295.82; household furniture 
$1,617.51 and land $346,221.37.

[¶47]   Incredibly, they took depreciation on 
the acquired property for that first full year of $110,636 to help accumulate an 
intended partnership tax loss write-off totaling $214,190. The 1983 tax return 
for the few months of operation was similarly tax loaded to show a loss of 
$61,834 with no beginning capital and no capital contributed so that each of the 
two participants took a $30,917 tax loss without capital investment for credit 
against other income. The December 31, 1984 ledger shows at a booked out payable 
for the purchase, "Mortgage Payable-Patricia Brooks, $676,250.18"; "Notes 
Payable-Brooks-Cattle, $327,105.83"; and loan obtained from the PCA secured by 
the assets purchased from the PCA of $247,895.68.

[¶48]   The Brooks Ranch consisted of 14,038 
acres deeded grazing land; 5,054 acres irrigated land; 10,563 leased land state; 
520 acres leased land Union Pacific; 12,297 AUM BLM lands; and 4 3/4 shares of 
the Rock Springs Grazing Association stock which permitted grazing on the 
alternative sections owned by the Union Pacific and the stock for agricultural 
purposes in the area at a very significant value.

[¶49]   When the property was recaptured from 
the Arambels, the personal property and livestock which had been appraised at 
$946,803 was sold for $737,481. The real estate which the Arambels listed as a 
purchase of $346,221.37 was sold by the estate for $1 million. Consequently, 
what the Arambels listed as a purchase in 1983 totalling $346,221.37 was sold by 
the estate in 1986, after a severe drop in ranch land values for $1 million 
payable in cash and not over fifty-two years. Unfortunately, the sale price was 
impacted by the $440,000 Arambel management settlement and something more than 
$86,000 in legal fees.

[¶50]   However proximately caused, this estate 
sustained a very severe loss and decrease in value between the date of death of 
Brooks in 1983, compared to what is available in this record showing the actual 
receipts after the Arambel transaction was unraveled, and final liquidation in 
1986.7

[¶51]   For this appeal, as a summary judgment 
absolution of the conduct portrayed, we are required to examine whether Zebre 
incurred any enforceable economic responsibility for that million dollar loss. 
The majority declines to enforce a responsibility, and I dissent. First, the 
majority eschews assessing responsibility for the conspiring attorney on the 
providence of zealous performance of duties for the client. The entire 
conjecture provided to sustain their holding misses the point. Zebre 
orchestrated negotiations and sale of the estate property in the absence of the estate's attorney. As such, he 
assumed the fiduciary responsibility or he was deliberately participating in 
conspiratorial fraud. Averill, Attorney's Liability to Third Persons for 
Negligent Malpractice, II Land & Water L.Rev. 379 (1967).

[T]here is an aspect of this problem which goes to the 
heart of the legal profession. The attorney holds a responsible position in the 
community. In a sense he has been given a monopoly. Only a select few who 
qualify may represent that they can perform the specialized tasks. Because of 
the attorney's status he must always maintain a high standard of conduct toward 
the court and the community. One of the more recurring cries today is the need 
to improve the general reputation of and respect for the legal profession. 
Unfortunately many laymen feel that there is one rule of law when they are the 
defendant and another when the attorney is. This is particularly true when the 
attorney is sued for negligence. An injured client in such litigation rather 
than having one attorney advocating his side of the case, one against him and 
one neutral seeking justice, in fact might feel that 
he is not only faced with one against him but also with two subconsciously 
hostile. This kind of attitude toward the bar must be changed.

Id. 
at 402-03 (emphasis in original and footnotes omitted). See Note, The Rules of 
Professional Conduct: Basis for Civil Liability of Attorneys, 39 U.Fla.L.Rev. 
777 (1987). Cf. Faure and Strong, The Model Rules of Professional Conduct: No 
Standard for Malpractice, 47 Mont.L.Rev. 363 (1986).

[¶52]   I will discuss in detail other 
circumstances which must be assumed to be true under summary judgment review and 
the appropriate legal application to the status of the attorney as he assisted 
the buyer and advised the seller in violation of legal ethics. ABA, Opinions of 
the Committee on Professional Ethics 43 (1967); ABA, Model Code of Professional 
Responsibility and Code of Judicial Conduct, DR 7-104 at 37 (1982).

[¶53]   The majority seems indifferent to 
breaches in Wyoming's canons of professional responsibility and disciplinary 
code by an attorney negotiating directly with a represented person without 
notification or approval of the by-passed attorney. Again, the majority draws 
too tightly the absolution against misfeasance responsibility under these circumstances. The majority also ignores 
the more modern approach when it allows no civil remedy for damages for 
intentionally caused harm in violation of basic canons of legal practice and 
responsibility which, although it may not create a cause of action, defines a 
duty of due care.8 

[¶54]   The majority casually inferred fraud by 
stating:

Brooks and the Bank are not able to establish on the record 
any actual misrepresentations or statements allegedly made by Zebre with 
knowledge that they were false and with the intent that Brooks should rely upon 
them. * * *

* * 
* Brooks and the Bank [successor trustee] have failed to assert any facts 
necessary to establish the elements justifying a cause of action for 
fraud.

[¶55]   The entire transaction in text and 
tenor was patently fraudulent in a fashion not significantly less obnoxious than 
any sale of the Brooklyn Bridge.

[¶56]   It is the majority who determines that 
an attorney in violation of the canons of professional responsibility assumes no 
economic responsibility when he advises the person he is defrauding not to 
consult that person's attorney. I will address the three rationale offered by 
the majority. These issues are (1) absolution of the conspiring attorney by 
excuse of zealous representation; (2) disregard of violated professional 
responsibility as an officer of this court by direct negotiation with a 
represented individual; and (3) fraudulent misrepresentation of the defrauded 
individual's need for legal assistance in arranging a sales transaction which 
can best be characterized as cheating a widow and her minor children to steal 
their inheritance. Comprehensive fraud in the entire transaction occurred by 
abusing the interests of an individual who, inexperienced as she was, simply had 
no knowledge of the time value of money.

B. 
Assumed Responsibility by Conduct

[¶57]   The meeting at which the 
"unconscionable" sales agreement was first addressed occurred in Zebre's law 
office.

     THE COURT: Let me 
interrupt. Who was there the first time you went?

     THE WITNESS: My daughter 
Kathy, and Pete and John, and Mr. Zebre.

     Q. (By Mr. White) Now, 
during that meeting, were you represented by an attorney?

     A. No.

     Q. At that time, was the 
estate in progress?

     A. Yes.

     Q. Who was the attorney for 
the estate at that time?

     A. Galen West.

     Q. And did you suggest that 
Mr. West be involved in these negotiations?

     A. I said - yes. I told 
them that I thought that I should talk to Galen being that he, you know, was 
representing the estate. And John says, "You don't need to talk to Galen because 
he won't let you do it because he wants all the money."

     Q. Now, Mrs. Brooks, there 
are two John's that were present.

     A. John 
Arambel.

     Q. John Zebre and John 
Arambel.

     A. And John Zebre told me, 
too, not to talk to West about it because he wouldn't want me to lease 
it.

     Q. Now, just repeat again, 
what did John Arambel say?

     A. He told me not to get 
Galen because he said, "All he'll do is tell you not to do it, `cause  he'll want all your 
money."

     Q. And what did Mr. Zebre 
say?

     A. And he said, "Don't tell 
Galen because" he said, "he'll just tell you not to lease that 
ranch."

[¶58]   The next meeting occurred when Zebre 
came to the house of Patricia Brooks:

     Q. What happened, then, 
after that [earlier] meeting?

     A. Kathy and I left and 
went home. And then Mr. Zebre came to my house.

     Q. Did he call you before 
he came to your house?

     A. He called me and said, 
"I'll be stopping on my way back from lunch." He said, "I live    right 
up the hill from you." And he said, "I'll stop on my way back." He said, "I want 
to talk to you."

      Q. Well, now, is this 
the same day?

     A. No, this was a day after 
or so. And when he come back, he wanted the will and he had a paper. My brother 
was there. And my brother asked him something about the equipment.

Q. 
Well, Mr. Zebre came to your house how many times before the contract was 
signed?

     A. Twice.

     Q. Okay. Now, we'll be 
talking about the first time. What happened? Why did he come to your house the 
first time?

     A. He came for the 
will.

    Q. A copy of the 
will?

     A. A copy of the 
will.

     Q. Why did he say he needed 
that?

     A. He didn't. He just said 
he wanted a copy of the will; he wanted to read it.

[¶59]   A third visit occurred by a trip of the 
attorney to the house of Patricia Brooks:

     A. And then he come back 
some other time and he had the contract or whatever it was. I can't remember if 
it was a contract. Jimmy was there, my brother, and my brother asked him 
something about the equipment.

     Q. Now, he came to your 
house a second time?

     A. Yes.

     Q. When was that in 
relation to the first visit?

    A. That was like a day before the 
contract.

     Q. This would be like 
August 11th, 1983?

     A. Uh-huh.

     Q. And what time of day did 
he come to your house?

     A. Oh, I'd say it was a 
little after one o'clock, not too long after that. About five after 
one.

     Q. And who was present when 
he arrived?

     A. My brother 
Jim.

     Q. And 
yourself?

     A. And myself.

     Q. And what 
transpired?

     A. Well, he had the lease, 
and he got to talking and Jim said - Jimmy read some of the lease. And then my 
brother says, "Well, how about this equipment in here?" And he says, "Well, 
don't worry about a thing, `cause we're not going to cheat your sister." And he 
got up and left.

     Q. Mr. Zebre said that 
-

     A. Yes.

     Q. - to your brother 
Jim?

     A. Yes.

[¶60]   And again the next day after John 
Arambel called her to go to Zebre's office to sign the "lease":

A. 
Well, it was like one o'clock, and they told me to be down there right away. So, 
I went right down. And -

Q. 
Now, excuse me. They called you on the day you signed the contract?

A. 
Yes.

Q. 
What time did they call you?

A. 
It was around one o'clock, I'd say. Maybe a little after.

Q. 
What did Mr. Arambel say in that telephone conversation?

A. 
He said, "We have the lease ready. Would you come down and meet us at Zebre's 
office to sign it?"

Q. 
Did he give you any reason why that particular time?

A. 
No.

Q. 
Was there any sense of urgency in that or what?

A. 
No. They just said that they had to get back to Farson to work. They wanted to 
get the contract signed.

Q. 
So, when did they tell you to be down to Zebre's office?

A. 
They called and told me to come down right away.

Q. 
So, they called you about one o'clock and told you to come down right 
away?

A. 
Yes.

Q. 
And did you go to Zebre's office right away?

A. 
Yes.

Q. 
And approximately what time did you arrive at Zebre's office? 

A. I 
would say it was around one-thirty.

Q. 
Did you talk to anybody prior to going down there?

A. 
No.

Q. 
Did you go by yourself or with somebody?

A. I 
went by myself.

Q. 
Who was in Zebre's office when you arrived?

A. 
Pete and John and Mr. Zebre.

Q. 
And there were no other persons?

A. 
No.

Q. 
Tell us, then, when you arrived what happened?

A. 
When I got there, I was sat down for a few minutes, and then they - and the girl 
says, "Well, you can go in. Go back." So, I went back and I sat down. And they 
had the contracts all there. There was a stack of them. And he said, "We read 
through it, parts of it." I didn't understand. I didn't bring my glasses, so I 
couldn't read it. And he -

Q. 
Did you tell him that?

A. 
Yes, I told him, I says, "Well, I can't read it `cause I didn't bring my 
glasses."

Q. 
Okay.

A. 
And he read through it and then he said, "Here, sign it." So, I signed it. And 
then after I signed it -

Q. 
Excuse me, Mrs. Brooks, but you say he read through it. Did he read word for 
word?

A. I 
don't think so.

Q. 
Did you understand what he was saying?

A. 
No.

Q. 
Did you ask him to delay the signing of the contract `till you saw your 
attorney?

A. 
No, I did not.

Q. 
Did they offer to postpone the signing of the contract `till you had an 
opportunity to see an attorney?

A. 
No.

Q. 
Did John Arambel suggest you wait until you saw an attorney?

A. 
No.

Q. 
Did Peter Arambel suggest you wait?

A. 
No.

Q. 
Mr. Zebre?

A. 
No.

Q. 
So, you didn't read the contract?

A. 
No.

Q. 
And is it your testimony that Mr. Zebre read parts of the contract?

A. 
Yes.

Q. 
Then what happened?

A. 
Then I signed it. And then Mr. Zebre said, "Well, I better call Saima right 
away." And I said, well, I didn't know if Saima had been back from California 
yet or not. And he said, "Well, I'm calling her anyway."

Q. 
Now, when you say "Saima" -

A. 
McCurtain.

Q. 
Saima McCurtain. And did he - did Saima come to the meeting?

A. 
Yes, she did.

Q. 
How long a period of time was it after you signed it before she came to the 
meeting?

A. I 
think around fifteen minutes, Saima was there. She came right from 
work.

Q. 
Tell us what happened as soon as Mrs. McCurtain arrived at the 
meeting.

A. 
Well, she came in and she sat down at the far end of the table. Mr. Zebre handed 
her the contract and told her to sign it. And she says, "Well, do you think I 
should read it first?" He said, "No, I don't think it's necessary."

Q. 
Now, did you have an opportunity to talk with Mrs. McCurtain -

A. 
No, I didn't.

Q. - 
prior to the time she signed the contract?

A. 
No.

Q. 
Did you talk to her at all before that time?

A. 
No.

Q. 
All right. Did she read the contract; do you know?

A. 
She just went over parts and she asked me, "How about the Rock Springs Grazing?" 
And I said, "No, I'm just letting them use the ground on it." And then she 
signed it. And then Mr. Zebre told her it didn't matter whether she signed it or 
she didn't sign it.

Q. 
Did she sign the agreement after you signed it?

A. 
After John and Pete and I had signed it, then Saima signed it after - when she 
came in.

Q. 
Did she receive a copy of the contract?

A. I 
don't remember whether she - I don't think she did.

Q. 
Did they suggest to her that she would have an opportunity to have an attorney 
present for her?

A. 
No.

* * 
* * * *

Q. 
(By Mr. White) Now, after she signed the contract, what happened?

A. 
Well, they got up and we went out of the office. And Saima was going ahead of 
me, and when I got my coat on, I heard John Zebre say, "I can't wait to throw 
these in Galen's face Monday morning.9

[¶61]   What right for the contended million 
dollar loss does the defrauded seller have against the attorney who pursued the 
conduct described? This case is epitomized by relevancy to a death penalty 
statement involving prosecutorial activity. Minnick v. State, 551 So. 2d 77 
(Miss. 1988).

     We have a rule that seems 
to work well in civil cases. A lawyer is forbidden to communicate with the 
opposing party who has a lawyer without that lawyer being present. At the very 
least, he must give notice of his intentions to or obtain consent of opposing 
counsel. This rule is undergirded by an ethical principle. All accept that a lawyer who approaches a represented third 
party without going through counsel should be severely sanctioned. And this 
is so though the lawyer uses a lay representative or paralegal to do his dirty 
work.

Think what we would do in a personal injury case. The 
injured party is represented and has been engaged in settlement negotiations 
with the prospective defendant and his lawyer. Unbeknownst to plaintiff's 
lawyer, defense counsel's paralegal investigator approaches plaintiff and 
emerges with a settlement agreement for a sum substantially less than counsel 
had been demanding. Or, suppose the investigator obtained a(n oral) statement 
that compromises plaintiff's case. We know well what 
would happen, the only point of mystery being whether defense counsel would be 
shot or flogged.

Id. 
at 101 (emphasis added and footnotes omitted). See also Trans-Cold Express v. 
Arrow Motor Transit, Inc., 440 F.2d 1216, 1219 (7th Cir. 1971) and Bruske v. Arnold, 44 Ill. 2d 132, 254 N.E.2d 453 (1969).

[¶62]   Zebre assumed the responsibility of an 
advising attorney when he advised Patricia Brooks to exclude her counsel. Since 
Zebre undertook to advise, direct, and control the negotiations, he assumed 
responsibility to both parties. When he said he would not cheat the estate and 
Patricia Brooks, we need only enforce that bargain by requiring a compensatory 
payment equal to the losses his legal activities precipitated. Collins v. 
Binkley, 750 S.W.2d 737 (Tenn. 1988). Recognizing that legal assistance is 
needed to protect a pending estate when the attorney excludes proper counsel, he 
then assumes that responsibility by replacement. Cf. Fickett v. Superior Court 
of Pima County, 27 Ariz. App. 793, 558 P.2d 988 (1976). Furthermore, where there is a duty to speak, which here was 
certainly created by Wyoming's Rules of Professional Conduct for Attorneys at 
Law 4.2, silence may be as misleading as a positive misrepresentation of 
existing facts. Hennigan v. Harris County, 593 S.W.2d 380 (Tex.Civ.App. 
1980).

[¶63]   A vast collection of case law, see 
Treece & Hall, Attorney's Liability: Negligent Misrepresentations to Third 
Parties - a Growing Threat, 31 For The Defense 18 (July 1989), some of it cited 
by the majority, can be found but no case approaches this factual situation. 
Categories of cases with little precedential value to this case are included in 
Zebre's brief and the majority opinion. The first case involved a litigation 
privilege case. Here, no litigation was involved when the fraudulent 
misrepresentation developed. Silberg v. Anderson, 50 Cal. 3d 205, 50 Cal. 3d 343A, 
266 Cal. Rptr. 638, 786 P.2d 365 (1990). The answer suggested in Silberg need not be applied here - 
criminal prosecution for perjury, solicitation of perjury, or even, though 
clearly appropriate, state bar disciplinary proceedings. Lacking practical 
involvement in pending litigation with bi-lateral representation, the interest 
of justice criteria can be maintained. Cf. Bradley v. Hartford Accident and 
Indemnity Co., 30 Cal. App. 3d 818, 106 Cal. Rptr. 718 (1973). This general 
category of cases deals with a disgruntled litigant's suit against the opposing 
attorney. Briscoe v. LaHue, 460 U.S. 325, 333, 103 S. Ct. 1108, 1114, 75 L. Ed. 2d 96 (1983); Friedman, 312 N.W.2d 585. See likewise Bird v. Rothman, 128 Ariz. 599, 627 P.2d 1097 (Ariz. App. 1981) and Brody v. Ruby, 267 N.W.2d 902 (Iowa 
1978).

[¶64]   This is not a suit by one litigant 
against the attorney for the opposing litigant. This is an ex parte contact and 
negotiation of an unconscionable contract by convincing Patricia Brooks to 
exclude her attorney. We cannot compare what Zebre, as a lawyer, did with a 
doctor upset that a lawyer represented a former patient in an unsuccessful 
medical malpractice lawsuit. Friedman, 312 N.W.2d 585. This is not a case 
addressing the protected right of a citizen to have access to the courts. Tappen 
v. Ager, 599 F.2d 376 (10th Cir. 
1979); Bickel v. Mackie, 447 F. Supp. 1376 (N.D. Iowa 1978); Hill v. Willmott, 
561 S.W.2d 331 (Ky.App. 1978); Garcia v. Rodey, Dickason, Sloan, Akin & 
Robb, P.A., 106 N.M. 757, 750 P.2d 118 (1988); Drago v. Buonagurio, 46 N.Y.2d 778, 413 N.Y.S.2d 910, 386 N.E.2d 821 (1978).

[¶65]   This is also not a case of an 
unrepresented party being misled by what an attorney told his own client. These 
third-party reliance cases are addressed in Vanguard Production, Inc. v. Martin, 
894 F.2d 375 (10th Cir. 
1990); First Florida Bank v. Maximum Mitchell & Co., 558 So. 2d 9 (Fla. 
1990); Harris v. Bonacci, 109 A.D.2d 1072, 487 N.Y.S.2d 224, aff'd 65 N.Y.2d 876, 493 N.Y.S.2d 309, 482 N.E.2d 1225 (1985); Restatement (Second) of Torts, § 
552 (1977). This is the third-party beneficiary concept as a contractual status 
creating an enforceable duty to the third party. This concept follows the 
doctrine of Ultramares Corporation v. Touche, 255 N.Y. 170, 174 N.E. 441 (1931) 
from which Glanzer v. Shepard, 233 N.Y. 236, 135 N.E. 275 (1922) followed and to 
be now applied to attorneys in Vereins-Und Westbank AG v. Carter, 691 F. Supp. 704 (S.D.N.Y. 1988). See also Flaherty, 492 A.2d 618 and Note, Attorney 
Liability to Third Parties For Corporate Opinion Letters, 64 B.U.L.Rev. 415 
(1984).

[¶66]   The adversary-non adversary dichotomy 
in litigative activities must be recognized. Pelham v. Griesheimer, 92 Ill. 2d 13, 64 Ill.Dec. 544, 440 N.E.2d 96 (1982); ABA/BNA, Lawyers' Manual on 
Professional Conduct, Current Reports at 413 (December 20, 1989). The 
adversarial process in law requires two attorneys, each representing a party, 
pitted against one another. A like responsibility was found for the attorney's 
obligation to a buyer when he, as seller's attorney, failed to provide a proper 
acknowledgement on the deed of conveyance, Collins, 750 S.W.2d 737, and when the 
attorney for the collection agency that owed a duty to the account assignor 
negligently failed to pursue the collection, Donald v. Garry, 19 Cal. App. 3d 769, 
97 Cal. Rptr. 191 (1971). The key to the establishment of a duty is expected 
reliance. That is the case here. Roberts v. Ball, Hunt, Hart, Brown & 
Baerwitz, 57 Cal. App. 3d 104, 128 Cal. Rptr. 901 (1976), duty to reveal business 
entity status of partnership to lender; Stewart v. Sbarro, 142 N.J. Super. 581, 
362 A.2d 581 (1976), the duty undertaken that initiates consideration of 
liability for negligent performance. The required performance is use of ordinary 
skill and knowledge, Eisenberg v. Gagnon, 766 F.2d 770 (3rd Cir. 1985), securities selling, attorney had economic interest in 
the operation; Bradford Securities Processing Services, Inc. v. Plaza Bank and 
Trust, 653 P.2d 188 (Okla. 1982), 
bond counsel attorney's opinion; Rizzo v. Haines, 520 Pa. 484, 555 A.2d 58 (Pa. 
1989).

[¶67]   We deal here with what Zebre told 
Patricia Brooks in regard to her need for independent advice, Crutchley v. First 
Trust and Savings Bank, 450 N.W.2d 877 (Iowa 1990), in a transaction which she 
obviously did not understand and in which was, by any circumstance of normal 
real estate sales, patently fraudulent in perspective and effect. Greycas, Inc. 
v. Proud, 826 F.2d 1560 (7th Cir. 1987). See the example given in Harad v. Aetna Cas. 
& Sur. Co., 839 F.2d 979 (3rd Cir. 1988). There is no subjective good faith excuse for attorney 
negligence. An attorney in Wyoming is held to the standard of care which would 
be exercised by a reasonably prudent attorney. Bobbitt v. Weeks, 774 S.W.2d 638 
(Tex. 1989). As discussed in the next section, this includes ethical conduct 
which relates to standards of care and performance. Elementary principles 
developed in medical malpractice cases are equally applicable to the attorney's 
standard of care. What is expected of the medical profession should also be 
provided by the legal profession. Cleckner v. Dale, 719 S.W.2d 535 (Tenn. App. 
1986); Ward, Developments in Legal Malpractice Liability, 31 S.Tex.L. Rev. 121 
(1990); Comment, Evidence - Cleckner v. Dale: Admissibility of Expert Testimony 
on Standard of Care in Legal Malpractice Cases, 18 Mem.St.U.L.Rev. 555 (1988). 
"The law of professional malpractice should be uniform, unless it can reasonably 
be shown that one profession is more deserving of protection than another for 
valid policy or social reasons." Ward, supra, 31 S.Tex.L.Rev. at 142-43.10

[¶68]   The district court characterized the 
understanding that Patricia Brooks had about the transaction, which she called a 
lease, and what the Arambels booked out as a purchase when it stated in decision 
letter:

     I am convinced, under the 
circumstances, that the contract was so one-sided as to be oppressive; that the 
sellers were deprived of meaningful choice; that there was no real opportunity 
for meaningful negotiation; that there was such gross inequality of bargaining 
power that fair negotiations were not possible for the estate, that Mrs. Brooks 
was in fact uneducated, intellectually illiterate, and the type of person easily 
deceived and susceptible of being taken advantage of; and that Mrs. Brooks did 
not comprehend and was not knowledgeably aware of the contents of the contract 
and its effect on her and her children. I doubt that even today she is fully 
aware of its terms, despite it having been explained to her as often as it 
has.

[¶69]   Not only do the authorities cited by 
the majority not countenance attorney performance of this type, but the 
extensive case law provides no example that would lend justification in these 
facts for immunity from responsibility by the attorney. Cf. Day v. Rosenthal, 
170 Cal. App. 3d 1125, 217 Cal. Rptr. 89 (1985) and Munson v. Linnick, 255 Cal. App. 2d 589, 63 Cal. Rptr. 340 (1967). There is no automatic immunity for 
attorneys from their tortious conduct. Havens v. Hardesty, 43 Colo. App. 162, 600 P.2d 116 (1979). See also Comment, Attorney Malpractice: Use of Contract Analysis 
to Determine the Existence of an Attorney-Client Relationship, 63 Minn.L. Rev. 
751 (1979) and Note, Attorney's Liability to Third Parties for Malpractice: The 
Growing Acceptance of Liability in the Absence of Privity, 21 Wn.burn L.J. 48 
(1981).

[¶70]   National Sav. Bank of District of 
Columbia v. Ward, 100 U.S. 195, 25 L. Ed. 621 (1879), serving as the ancestor of lawyer immunity, cannot 
be applied here. Ward was a privity case and very clearly recognized that cases 
where fraud or collusion are alleged and proved are exceptions to the 
non-liability privilege. Here, for the Brooks estate, where the transactional 
incidents sound in fraud and collusion, there is no precedential relevance from 
Ward to be derived. "[W]here there is neither fraud or collusion nor privity of 
contract, the party will not be held liable, unless the act is one imminently 
dangerous to the lives of others or is an act performed in pursuance of some 
legal duty." Id. 100 U.S.  at 206. Conversely, that court recognized in citing 
Langridge v. Levy, 4 Mee. & W. 337:

[T]hat as there is fraud and damage the result of that 
fraud, not from an act remote and consequential, but one contemplated by the 
defendant at the time as one of the results, the party guilty of the fraud is 
responsible to the party injured.

Ward, 100 U.S.  at 206. "Where there is fraud or collusion, 
the party will be held liable even though there is no privity of contract." Id. 
at 205.

[¶71]   Ward only wrote the title opinion for 
the buyer and not for the funding bank. Privity or its absence has no relation 
to this transaction where the challenged conduct was directly between the 
attorney and the defrauded listener. Cf. Symposium, Attorney's Liability in 
Title Examination, 6 Wyo.L.J. 177, 181 (1952) (citing Glanzer, 135 N.E. 275, for 
a duty derived from representation of fact with expectable reliance). The 
reliance criteria was recognized in the name case, Williams v. Polgar, 391 Mich. 
6, 215 N.W.2d 149 (1974), which incidently cited Symposium, supra, 6 Wyo.L.J. 
177, in following Judge Cardozo's opinion in Glanzer for abstractor liability. 
Michigan had categorically eliminated the requirement of privity. Williams, 215 N.W.2d  at 153. See also Lawall v. Groman, 180 Pa. 532, 37 A. 98 (1897), where an 
attorney title examiner for the borrower was involved with a suit by the lender. 
In Stinson v. Brand, 738 S.W.2d 186 (Tenn. 1987), the court adopted Restatement 
(Second) of Torts, supra, § 522 in perceiving possible negligence from failure 
to tell elderly vendors who relied on them that a mortgage interest upon sale 
reflected by the mortgage should be recorded. The New Mexico court similarly 
applied Restatement (Second) of Torts, supra, § 522 to a misconceived real 
estate transaction to provide a viable case against the participating lawyer in 
Holland v. Lawless, 95 N.M. 490, 623 P.2d 1004 (1981).

[¶72]   A uniform thread in those jurisdictions 
which abjured limiting liability by privity is that responsibility still depends 
on an examination of the transaction. Cornell v. Wunschel, 408 N.W.2d 369 (Iowa 
1987). Cf. Landrigan v. Nelson, 227 Neb. 835, 420 N.W.2d 313 (1988) and Ames 
Bank v. Hahn, 205 Neb. 353, 287 N.W.2d 687 (1980), where the court recognized 
the facts and circumstance test but declined factual application in a 
negligently prepared will case. The bad will cases initiated from California 
decisions in Lucas v. Hamm, 56 Cal. 2d 583, 15 Cal. Rptr. 821, 364 P.2d 685 (1961) and Biakanja v. Irving, 49 Cal. 2d 647, 320 P.2d 16 (1958). See also Heyer v. Flaig, 70 Cal. 2d 223, 74 Cal. Rptr. 225, 449 P.2d 161 (1969) and ABA/BNA, supra, at 365. The thesis of the will cases sounded 
in a third-party beneficiary concept of contract as a recognized duty of the 
drafter to the anticipated beneficiaries whose interest was explicit in the 
testator's employment of the lawyer. Walker v. Lawson, 526 N.E.2d 968 (Ind. 
1988). Similarly, inducement and reliance cases run the gamut from title 
opinions to probate related activities. Greycas, Inc., 826 F.2d 1560; Fickett, 558 P.2d 988; Hermann v. Frey, 537 N.E.2d 529 (Ind. App. 1989); Cornell, 408 N.W.2d 369; Elam v. Hyatt Legal Services, 44 Ohio St.3d 175, 541 N.E.2d 616 (1989) 
(distinguishing Simon v. Zipperstein, 32 Ohio St.3d 74, 512 N.E.2d 636 (1987), 
where privity denied liability in a negligently drafted will lawsuit by a 
beneficiary). See likewise Licata v. Spector, 26 Conn. Sup. 378, 225 A.2d 28 
(1966), privity defense rejected and Guy v. Liederbach, 279 Pa. Super. 543, 421 A.2d 333 (1980), aff'd in part and rev'd in part 501 Pa. 47, 459 A.2d 744 
(1983).11 See also Auric v. Continental Casualty Co., 111 
Wis.2d 507, 331 N.W.2d 325 (1983). Cf. Green Spring Farms v. Kersten, 136 Wis.2d 
304, 401 N.W.2d 816 (1987). Contra Berry v. Dodson, Nunley & Taylor P.C., 
717 S.W.2d 716 (Tex. App. 1987), restating the present rule requiring absolute 
priority. See Berry v. Dodson, Nunley & Taylor, P.C., 729 S.W.2d 690 (Tex. 
1987).

     Certainly the granting of a 
writ of error is not a conclusive indication that the Texas Supreme Court was 
ready to abandon the privity requirement. It does indicate, however, that the 
court was prepared to re-examine the present state of the law in the face of a 
very sympathetic factual setting for the injured plaintiffs. In the future, 
courts of appeals dealing with this question should consider the fact that a 
writ of error was granted on the isolated issue of privity as a bar to intended beneficiaries and the fact that a decision was 
preempted by settlement.

Baron, The Expansion of Legal Malpractice Liability in 
Texas, 29 S.Tex.L.Rev. 355, 361 (1987) (emphasis in original). The direction was 
preordained by the accounting case of Shatterproof Glass Corporation v. James, 
466 S.W.2d 873 (Tex.Civ. App. 1971), where Restatement (Second) of Torts, supra, 
§ 522 was applied. See Ward, Legal Malpractice in Texas, 19 S.Tex.L.J. 587, 611 
(1978).

     However, the injured third 
party plaintiff may well have valid arguments for bringing a legal malpractice 
case. If it is foreseeable that a third party will 
rely on the work of an attorney, then the general principles of tort law suggest 
that the innocent party should not bear the full loss proximately caused by the 
negligence of an attorney. To hold otherwise would be inequitable to foreseeable 
third parties and would fail to deter negligence in such instances, having an 
overall negative effect on the reputation of the legal profession.

* * 
* Under Shatterproof, the demise of the privity defense appears imminent in 
actions by third parties who were foreseeable beneficiaries of and/or justified 
in reliance on the negligent work of an attorney.

Id. 
at 610-11 (emphasis in original and footnotes omitted). Comment, Lawyers' 
Negligence Liability to Non-Clients: A Texas Viewpoint, 14 St. Mary's L.J. 405 
(1983). 

[¶73]   Also relating generally to the sphere 
of liability of the attorney to the non-client are the false arrest and 
malicious prosecution cases as again within a category of facts and 
circumstances defined within a theory of tort, a zone of duty contrasted with 
any contractual theory. Havens, 600 P.2d 116; Pomeranz v. Class, 82 Colo. 173, 257 P. 1086 (1927); Vernes 
v. Phillips, 266 N.Y. 298, 194 N.E. 762 (1935); Yahola v. Whipple, 189 Okla. 583, 118 P.2d 395 (1941). These 
cases are founded on an independent tort concept, wrongful attachment theory. 
Home Budget Loans, Inc. v. Jacoby & Meyers Law Offices, 207 Cal. App. 3d 1277, 
255 Cal. Rptr. 483 (1989); Carney v. Rotkin, Schmerin & McIntyre, 206 Cal. App. 3d 1513, 254 Cal. Rptr. 478 (1988); Munson, 63 Cal. Rptr. 340; Penalber 
v. Blount, 550 So. 2d 577 (La. 1989); Schierloh v. Kelly, 253 A.D. 373, 2 N.Y.S.2d 188 (1938); Gibson v. Holmes, 78 Vt. 110, 62 A. 11 (1905).

[¶74]   For summary judgment review purposes, 
Zebre knew Patricia Brooks served as an officer of the court as an executor and 
trustee at the time of these negotiations. Fickett, 558 P.2d 988. In August 1983, she had no definable interest for which she had an 
appropriate right of negotiation. Consequently, the conduct of Zebre in ex parte 
contact with her was especially egregious since not only involving a fraud 
perpetrated upon the court process, but also against the minor children who were 
heirs of the estate.12 That burden of misconduct was magnified not 
only by the negative misfeasance of direct contact, but by the affirmative 
behavior of aggressively advising a represented person not to see that person's 
attorney at a time when a fraudulent and unconscionable agreement was being 
prepared. Greycas, Inc., 826 F.2d  at 1565 (quoting Penrod v. Merrill Lynch, 
Pierce, Fenner & Smith Inc., 68 Ill. App.3d 75, 81-82, 24 Ill.Dec. 464, 469, 
385 N.E.2d 376, 381 (1979)) states the proposition as:

"[O]ne who in the course of his business or profession 
supplies information for the guidance of others in their business transactions" 
is liable for negligent misrepresentations that induce detrimental 
reliance.

Like 
Greycas, Inc. in that case in regard to the third party, Zebre here "used no 
care." Here also, there can be no doubt about the casual relationship between 
the misrepresentation and the sale completion and consequent estate loss. 
Greycas, Inc., 826 F.2d  at 1565. The Brooks-Zebre relationship is similar to 
Krahn v. Kinney, 43 Ohio St.3d 103, 538 N.E.2d 1058 (1989), where Krahn actually 
thought she was being represented but the attorney failed to communicate a 
favorable plea bargain because of the effect on his real client.

[¶75]   A somewhat similar transactional 
scenario occurred in Hill v. Okay Const. Co., Inc., 312 Minn. 324, 252 N.W.2d 107 (1977), where one lawyer represented both the buyer and the seller in a sale 
of a business. When problems developed following "sale," one party claimed 
intent to have a secured loan which was instead prepared as a sale. Expert 
testimony at trial contended negligence in the joint representation and in the 
result of the joint representation as an unsatisfactory sale documentation. The 
appellate court held the attorney liable for buyer's losses following purchase 
and the attorney fees incurred by both the buyer and the seller in defending 
claims of creditors. The principles followed in Hill can apply to Brooks where 
third-party counsel was excluded by Zebre from the negotiations.

C. 
Rules of Professional Responsibility

[¶76]   In the preamble to Wyoming's Rules of 
Professional Conduct for Attorneys at Law, there is required among other 
responsibilities:

 [1]    A lawyer is a representative of 
clients, an officer of the legal system and a public citizen having special 
responsibility for the quality of justice.

* * 
* * * *

 [7]    A lawyer's responsibilities as a 
representative of clients, an officer of the legal system and a public citizen 
are usually harmonious. Thus, when an opposing party is well represented a 
lawyer can be a zealous advocate on behalf of a client and at the same time 
assume that justice is being done. So also, a lawyer can be sure that preserving 
client confidences ordinarily serves the public interest because people are more 
likely to seek legal advice, and thereby heed their legal obligations, when they 
know their communications will be private.

[8]     In the nature of law 
practice, however, conflicting responsibilities are encountered. Virtually all 
difficult ethical problems arise from conflict between a lawyer's 
responsibilities to clients, to the legal system and to the lawyer's own 
interest in remaining an upright person while earning a satisfactory living. The 
Rules of Professional Conduct prescribe terms for resolving such conflicts. 
Within the framework of these Rules many difficult issues of professional 
discretion can arise. Such issues must be resolved through the exercise of 
sensitive professional and moral judgment guided by the basic principles 
underlying the Rules.

* * 
* * * *

[11]     The legal profession's 
relative autonomy carries with it special responsibilities of self-government. 
The profession has responsibility to assure that its regulations are conceived 
in the public interest and not in furtherance of parochial or self-interested 
concerns of the bar. Every lawyer is responsible for observance of the Rules of 
Professional Conduct. A lawyer should also aid in securing their observance by 
other lawyers. Neglect of these responsibilities compromises the independence of 
the profession and the public interest which it services.

[12]     Lawyers play a vital role 
in the preservation of society. The fulfillment of this role requires an 
understanding by lawyers of their relationship to our legal system. The Rules of 
Professional Conduct, when properly applied, serve to define that 
relationship.

[¶77]   Provisions of the Rules of Professional 
Conduct for Attorneys at Law further include:

Rule 
4.1. Truthfulness in statements to others.

In 
the course of representing a client a lawyer shall not knowingly:

(a) 
make a false statement of material fact or law to a third person; or

(b) 
fail to disclose a material fact to a third person when disclosure is necessary 
to avoid assisting a criminal or fraudulent act by a client, unless disclosure 
is prohibited by Rule 1.6.

Rule 
4.2. Communication with person represented by counsel.

     In representing a client, a 
lawyer shall not communicate about the subject of the representation with a 
party the lawyer knows to be represented by another lawyer in the matter, unless 
the lawyer has the consent of the other lawyer or is authorized by law to do 
so.[13]

[¶78]   This court has not always discounted 
the rules of professional conduct to determine acceptable conduct of attorneys 
relating to civil litigation. In Kath v. Western Media, Inc., 684 P.2d 98 (Wyo. 1984), 
we vitiated a compromise settlement which was, in effect, fraudulently obtained 
by counsel's concealment of certain file correspondence. In announcing that 
decision, this court quoted from Judge Rubin in A Causerie on Lawyers' Ethics in 
Negotiations, 35 La.L. Rev. 577, 589-90 (1975):

"If 
he is a professional and not merely a hired * * * hand, the lawyer is not free 
to do anything his client might do in the same circumstances. The corollary of 
that proposition does set a minimum standard: the lawyer must be at least as 
candid and honest as his client would be required to be. The agent of the 
client, that is, his attorney-at-law, must not perpetrate the kind of fraud or 
deception that would vitiate a bargain if practiced by his principal. Beyond 
that, the profession should embrace an affirmative ethical standard for 
attorneys' professional relationships with courts, other lawyers and the public: 
The lawyer must act honestly and in good faith."

Kath, 684 P.2d  at 101-02.

[¶79]   The hidden conflict relationship which 
is implicit in the decision in Kath is persuasive recognition of a similar 
responsibility where counsel violates the canons of ethics by arranging for 
direct negotiations with a person who had an attorney but was unrepresented 
during negotiations.

[¶80]   Here, however, the distillation of this 
responsibility is enumerated by the majority:

     We turn then to the contention of Brooks 
and the Bank that they are entitled to a cause of action arising out of an 
asserted violation of the rules adopted by this court relating to ethical 
conduct of attorneys. The clear rule is that no private cause of action in favor 
of a non-client can be found attributable to violations of the disciplinary 
rules relating to attorneys.

I 
strongly dissent from this casual diminution of an attorney's ethical 
responsibilities. Fraudulent conduct here resulted from intentional violation of 
the attorney's canon of ethics. One of the oldest precepts recognized by the 
profession is "no ex parte contact or negotiation with 
another lawyer's client."14

[¶81]   The significant 
volume of case law presented in the text, law journals, or cited by the majority 
does not relate to anything faintly resembling the pernicious impropriety 
here. Additionally, more modern cases accord significance and responsibility 
to canons of ethics as evidence of a standard of duty. An illustration of the 
reach of the Rules of Professional Conduct 4.2 is found in Papanicolaou v. Chase 
Manhattan Bank, N.A., 720 F. Supp. 1080 (S.D.N.Y. 1989), where an entire law 
firm was disqualified from further proceedings in an ongoing lawsuit following 
discussion of the case by firm members with the opposing litigant in the absence 
of litigant's counsel. That court found the integrity of the litigative process 
was at stake.

[¶82]   Specifically, Zebre violated his 
professional responsibility in the following particulars: (1) permitting an 
unrepresented estate executor to be subjected to ex parte negotiations under his 
aegis and within his office; (2) participating without arrangement for the 
attorney of the estate to be present; and (3) advising and counseling the 
unrepresented individual that the services of her lawyer need not be present 
while his own client helps negotiate an unconscionable agreement.

[¶83]   It was not just that the result was 
unconscionable, the action was unconscionable.

[¶84]   Friedman, 312 N.W.2d 585 provides no 
authority on this subject, founded as it is in a litigant suing the opposing 
attorney in the medical malpractice lawsuit. There is a difference as broad as 
the Pacific Ocean between the character of cases where a litigant attempts to 
sue the attorney of the opposing litigant and the case where the individual is 
involved in an ostensible joint representation arrangement and is without 
independent representation. With regard to the opposing attorney litigation in 
the medical malpractice purview, not only within W.R.C.P. 11, but also by 
separate statutory enactment, see W.S. 1-14-128, Wyoming doctors have 
unsuccessfully tried to predetermine exposure to litigation. See likewise Norton 
v. Hines, 49 Cal. App. 3d 917, 123 Cal. Rptr. 237 (1975) and Berlin v. Nathan, 64 
Ill. App.3d 940, 21 Ill.Dec. 682, 381 N.E.2d 1367 (1978). The issue is resolved 
upon the provence of free access to the courts. The discretion to file or not 
file litigation under the contours of professional ethics provides no 
comparative authority for ex parte contact with another attorney's client to 
procure an unconscionable agreement. See likewise, on attacking the attorney of 
the protagonist for the opposing trial litigant, Silberg, 786 P.2d 365; Hill, 561 S.W.2d 331; Brody, 267 N.W.2d 902; and Drago, 386 N.E.2d 821. 
The only other citation provided by the majority is an absolution of 
responsibility for harm caused by a violation of legal ethics in Hawkins v. King 
County, Department of Rehabilitative Services, Division of Involuntary Treatment 
Services, 24 Wn. App. 338, 602 P.2d 361 (1979). In Hawkins, defendant's criminal defense lawyer received summary 
judgment when sued for the tort of failure to reveal his client's mental state 
at bail hearing resulting in assault upon a third party upon the client's 
release as well as the client's attempted suicide. For various and obvious 
reasons, the facts of the situation where a confidential communication situation 
between attorney and client existed, fail in relevance here. Self-evident 
difference should be discerned. Not cited, but similarly postured in a suit 
against the opposing attorney after the lawsuit was defeated, see Bob Godfrey 
Pontiac, Inc. v. Roloff, 291 Or. 318, 630 P.2d 840 (1981). Cf. Tarasoff v. Regents of University of California, 17 Cal. 3d 425, 131 Cal. Rptr. 14, 551 P.2d 334 (1976).

[¶85]   Cornell, 408 N.W.2d 369 provides 
exhaustive references to the code of professional responsibility in a motel 
sales transaction. Answering the lawyer's contention that expert testimony was 
required, the court said:

     The code of professional 
responsibility clearly requires the attorney to be sensitive to the ethical 
concerns that arise when the attorney has a financial stake in the transaction 
or when the attorney represents individuals with differing interests in a 
transaction. See Committee on Professional Ethics & Conduct v. Mershon, 316 N.W.2d 895 (Iowa 1982) (attorney reprimanded for entering into business 
transaction with client without recommending that client obtain independent 
advice and without providing full disclosure, even though attorney did not act 
dishonestly and did not profit on the transaction).

* * 
* * * *

     Wunschels also argue that 
expert testimony was needed to establish a violation of the ethical standards. 
See generally Annotation, Admissibility and Necessity of Expert Evidence as to 
Standards of Practice and Negligence in Malpractice Action Against Attorney, 17 
A.L.R.3d 1442 (1968) (expert testimony required to establish standard of care to 
which attorney's acts are compared). Here, our code of professional 
responsibility clearly sets forth the standard of disclosure. It is then the 
jury's duty, as in a legal malpractice case, to compare the attorney's conduct 
with the appropriate standard. We conclude the trial court did not err in 
instructing the jury on the ethical standard clearly announced in Canon 5 of our 
code of professional responsibility.

Id. 
at 378.

[¶86]   There, as here, one party was 
unrepresented in the negotiations. Cornell is, however, not so egregious since 
at least ex parte avoidance of the client's own attorney in negotiation did not 
occur. The similarity of failure to disclose did exist. Mengis, Professional 
Responsibility, 50 La.L. Rev. 335, 342 (1989).

[¶87]   Application of the code to joint party 
relations was addressed in Lipton v. Boesky, 110 Mich. App. 589, 313 N.W.2d 163, 
166-67 (1981):

     The Code of Professional 
Responsibility is a standard of practice for attorneys which expresses in 
general terms the standards of professional conduct expected of lawyers in their 
relationship with the public, the legal system, and the legal profession. 
Holding a specific client unable to rely on the same standards in his 
professional relations with his own attorney would be patently unfair. We hold 
that, as with statutes, a violation of the Code is rebuttable evidence of 
malpractice. See Zeni v. Anderson, 397 Mich. 117, 129, 243 N.W.2d 270 
(1976).

[¶88]   Brody, 267 N.W.2d 902, recognized above 
and cited by the majority, also confined its decision to the circumstances of 
the case which was a suit against the antagonist's attorney in applying a 
no-evidence rule.15 The Montana court, in Carlson v. Morton, 229 
Mont. 234, 745 P.2d 1133 (1987), determined that an expert witness was required under the 
circumstances. Although, the court added that "[w]hile proof of the violation of 
some disciplinary rules may by itself establish negligence, such is not the case 
with the rules cited by [plaintiff]." Id. 745 P.2d  at 1137. Those claimed 
disciplinary rule violations were not the direct dealing involved in the Rules 
of Professional Conduct for Attorneys at Law 4.2 here. The difference has to be 
recognized between use of ethical code violation to create a private cause of 
action, Terry Cove North, Inc. v. Marr & Friedlander P.C., 521 So. 2d 22 
(Ala. 1988), and evidence of lack of due care or contractual violation such as 
the independent tort of fraud or false representation, Woodruff v. Tomlin, 616 F.2d 924 (6th Cir. 1980); Crest Investment Trust, Inc. v. Comstock, 23 Md. App. 
280, 327 A.2d 891 (1974). The modern perspective of professional malpractice has 
expanded to include:

"`1. 
The employment of the attorney or other basis for 
duty;

2. 
The failure of the attorney to exercise ordinary skill and knowledge; 
and

3. 
That such negligence was the proximate cause of damage to the plaintiff.' R. 
Mallen & V. Levit, Legal Malpractice 123 (1977)" * * *.

Guy, 
421 A.2d  at 336 (emphasis added and quoting Schenkel v. Monheit, 266 Pa. Super. 
396, 399, 405 A.2d 493, 494 (1979)). This case involves the other basis for duty 
created by attorney participation and unethical conduct in negotiating an 
unconscionable and illegal agreement. Crutchley, 450 N.W.2d 877.

[¶89]   Within the summary judgment status, 
mandatory inferences demonstrate that Zebre undertook to serve in fact as 
counsel for the estate and Patricia Brooks when he convinced Patricia Brooks to 
exclude proper counsel. Fickett, 558 P.2d 988. The disciplinary review in Matter of Pappas, 159 Ariz. 516, 768 P.2d 1161, 1167-68 (1988) (footnote omitted) provides perspective when the 
Arizona court recognized:

     The absence of an 
articulated attorney-client relationship on this particular transaction does not 
preclude a finding that respondent was obligated to exercise his professional 
legal judgment on the Petersons' behalf. Because the Petersons reasonably 
thought of respondent as their attorney, we find respondent was obligated to 
behave as their attorney. The existence of an attorney-client relationship 
depends largely on the client's "belief that it exists." Louisiana State Bar 
Ass'n v. Bosworth, 481 So. 2d 567, 571 (La. 1986) (citing Matter of McGlothlen, 
99 Wn.2d 515, 663 P.2d 1330 (1983), and 
E. Cleary, McCormick on Evidence § 88, at 208 (3d ed. [sic] 1972)). Therefore, 
where a person holds an objectively reasonable belief that a lawyer is acting as 
his attorney, relies on that belief and relationship, and the lawyer does not 
refute that belief, we will treat the relationship as one between attorney and 
client in bar disciplinary matters. Neville, 147 Ariz. 106, 708 P.2d 1297. We hold that in the Aloha transaction respondent and the 
Petersons were in an attorney-client relationship for purposes of the 
disciplinary rules at issue. We now consider the individual charges against 
respondent.

Accord Martin v. Kentucky Bar Association, 775 S.W.2d 519 
(Ky. 1989), where one of the bases for the five year suspension from practice 
was "that he communicated directly with an adverse party on the subject of 
representation knowing that the adverse party was represented by counsel and 
without the consent of that counsel, * * *." Id. at 519. Recognizing that 
"[f]raud includes anything calculated to deceive, including the suppression of 
truth and the suggestion of what is false * * *," In re Yamaguchi, 118 Ill. 2d 417, 113 Ill. Dec. 928, 931, 515 N.E.2d 1235, 1238 (1987), the Yamaguchi court 
stated:

     The canons of ethics 
contained in the Code [code of professional responsibility] constitute a safe 
guide for professional conduct, and an attorney may be disciplined for not 
observing them.

Id. 
113 Ill.Dec. at 932, 515 N.E.2d  at 1239.

[¶90]   The code of professional responsibility 
should be enforced. See Davenport v. State, 157 Ga. App. 704, 278 S.E.2d 440 
(1981), where a criminal conviction was reversed because of the appearance of 
impropriety from a conflict of interest. For civil representation, see Crawford 
W. Long Memorial Hospital of Emory University v. Yerby, 258 Ga. 720, 373 S.E.2d 749 (1988) where canons of ethics were applied. Accord Summerlin v. Johnson, 176 
Ga. App. 336, 335 S.E.2d 879 (1985).16

[¶91]   In Raine v. Drasin, 621 S.W.2d 895, 901 
(Ky. 1981), which was a successful suit by doctors after dismissal of a 
malpractice suit against them, expert testimony was permitted by a member of the 
ethics committee of the bar association:

Professor Leibson stated that, in his opinion, the actions 
of both Raine and Highfield did not comply with the standard of care for 
ordinary and prudent lawyers. Raine complains that the admission was improper. 
We believe that such evidence was properly introduced to show one of the key 
ingredients of a malicious prosecution action, viz., lack of probable 
cause.

The 
case itself was extraordinarily clear in demonstration of improvident legal 
practice in pursuing the malpractice suit against the particular doctors who, 
after dismissal of the suit against them by countersuit, recovered both general 
and punitive damages in trial court with appeal reversing only the punitive 
damages for retrial.

[¶92]   Zebre first tried to get employed to 
prepare Isaac Brook's will and after Isaac's death and commencement of probate, 
Zebre arranged to exclude the attorney for the estate from negotiations to sell 
the estate assets. In Jenkins v. Wheeler, 69 N.C. App. 140, 316 S.E.2d 354 
(1984), where plaintiff was the sole heir of decedent who, as a passenger, died 
as a result of an automobile accident with her stepfather as driver. The 
stepfather renounced administratorship in favor of his sister and committed 
suicide. His sister, no relative of plaintiff, then qualified as administratrix 
of her brother's estate also. While this was going on, administratrix and her 
attorney failed or refused to pursue a wrongful death action. Plaintiff sued the 
administratrix, the attorney and the laid-back insurance company. The attorney 
was favored by a motion to dismiss at trial court level and the appellate court 
reversed recognizing the conflict of interest for the attorney to represent both 
estates and applied criteria of the code of professional responsibility as a 
basis for liability within a conflict of interest misconduct occurrence. Citing 
DR 5-105(B) of the Code of Professional Responsibility, the Jenkins court 
said:

"An 
attorney's representation of two or more clients with adverse or conflicting 
interests constitutes such misconduct as to subject him to liability for 
malpractice, unless the attorney has obtained the consent of the clients after a 
full disclosure of all the facts concerning the dual representation." * * 
*

Jenkins also alleged that Wilson's legal advice to Ava 
Wheeler was wrongful and therefore also actionable. We are aware that an 
attorney acting in good faith and in an honest belief that his or her advice is 
well-founded is not answerable for mere errors of judgment. * * * However, the 
complaint in this case alleges not only that Wilson represented conflicting 
interests but that he was in collusion with the other defendants. Under the 
circumstances, we hold that plaintiff has adequately pleaded bad faith on 
Wilson's part. We further conclude that the Complaint makes out a case of 
negligence against Wilson and should not have been dismissed on that 
ground.

Id. 
316 S.E.2d  at 358 (citations omitted). R. Wise, Legal Ethics, 271 (2d ed. 1970 
& 1979 Supp.).

[¶93]   Close analysis of the current case law 
moving toward the elimination of privity in the tort concept legal malpractice 
liability factual situation - non-adversary attorney - establishes a balancing test. A good discussion is found in a North 
Carolina case, United Leasing Corporation v. Miller, 45 N.C. App. 400, 263 S.E.2d 313, 318 (1980):

Whether or not a party has placed himself in such a 
relation with another so that the law will impose upon him an obligation, 
sounding in tort and not in contract, to act in such a way that the other will 
not be injured calls for the balancing of various factors: (1) the extent to 
which the transaction was intended to affect the other person; (2) the 
foreseeability of harm to him; (3) the degree of certainty that he suffered 
injury; (4) the closeness of the connection between the defendant's conduct and 
the injury; (5) the moral blame attached to such conduct; and (6) the policy of 
preventing future harm.

[¶94]   I would argue that directly related to 
moral blame and a comparable policy of preventing future harm is the judiciary's 
responsibility for the enforcement of the code of professional responsibility. 
History demonstrates that the private litigant does a far better job of 
protecting individual rights than ever resulted from action from regulatory 
agencies of government. This concept is the driving force behind the large 
number of federal statutes providing for private litigation attorney's fees in 
enforcement of constitutional and statutory rights including, as examples, 42 
U.S.C.A. § 1988, Civil Rights Act, and 28 U.S.C.A. § 2412, Equal Access to 
Justice Act. This case provides significant witness since whatever may have 
occurred in regard to disciplinary proceedings, no substantial disciplinary 
action has occurred to this date against this attorney for the admitted and 
documented, deeply serious violation of legal ethics as explicitly provided in 
the court's own rules adopted to supervise the conduct of lawyers in the 
practice of law in Wyoming.17 Although involving direct representation 
malpractice, Woodruff, 616 F.2d  at 936 recognized the relationship of the canons 
of professional ethics to malpractice as defining the scope of a violated duty 
to the client as "evidence of the standards [of performance] 
required."

[¶95]   We are invested here with a factual 
situation providing striking similarities to Crest Investment Trust, Inc., 327 A.2d  at 904 (footnotes omitted):

     In the first place, counsel 
incurs a substantial risk of violation of Canon 5 of the Code of Professional 
Responsibility and the Disciplinary Rule based on this Canon, DR 5-105. The 
Canon declares that "A Lawyer Should Exercise Independent Professional Judgment 
on Behalf of a Client," and DR 5-105 states that in situations where the 
exercise of a lawyer's independent professional judgment on behalf of a client 
is likely to be adversely affected by his representation of another client, the 
lawyer may represent both clients only "if it is obvious that he can adequately 
represent the interest of each and if each consents to the representation after 
full disclosure of the possible effect of such representation on the exercise of 
his independent professional judgment on behalf of each."

     In addition, when an 
attorney undertakes dual representation without making the full disclosure 
required of him, he incurs the risk of civil liability to the client who suffers 
loss caused by such lack of disclosure. Lysick v. Walcom, 258 Cal. App. 2d 136, 65 Cal. Rptr. 406 (1968).

Further quoting from In Re Kamp, 40 N.J. 588, 194 A.2d 236, 
240 (1963), it was recognized that "`[a] conflict of interest is inherent in the 
relationship of buyer and seller; and [former] Canon 6 is applicable to every 
occasion in which an attorney undertakes to represent both the seller and the 
buyer under a sales contract.'" Crest Investment Trust, Inc., 327 A.2d  at 
905.

[¶96]   See Albright v. Burns, 206 N.J. Super. 
625, 503 A.2d 386, 389 (1986), which states:

     Further, a member of the 
bar owes a fiduciary duty to persons, though not strictly clients, who he knows 
or should know rely on him in his professional capacity. * * * We think it 
follows that privity should not be required between the attorney and one harmed 
by his breach of duty where the attorney had reason to foresee the specific harm 
which occurred.

[¶97]   With reference to the violation of 
ethical standards, the New Jersey court stated the more pervasive modern rule of 
responsibility:

     Poe urges that a violation 
of ethical standards is not tantamount to tortious conduct, particularly with 
regard to liability to a non-client. * * * While violations of ethical standards 
do not per se give rise to tortious claims, the 
standards set the minimum level of competency which must be displayed by all 
attorneys. * * * Where an attorney fails to meet the minimum standard of 
competence governing the profession, such failure can be considered evidence of 
malpractice. * * *

     While the burden of proving 
proximate causation between the breach of duty and the loss is upon plaintiffs, 
we think it clear Poe's conduct aided in divesting Bruch's estate of its most 
important asset. * * *

Plaintiffs' proofs give rise to an inference of malpractice 
by Poe. Dismissal was unwarranted.

Id. 
503 A.2d  at 390-91. See likewise Crutchley, 450 N.W.2d 877.

[¶98]   The New Jersey Supreme Court in Haynes 
v. First National State Bank of New Jersey, 87 N.J. 163, 432 A.2d 890, 899-900 
(1981) (footnotes omitted) similarly addressed the conflict danger in will 
preparation when presenting one of several errors:

     It is not difficult to 
appreciate the policy reasons for creating an especially strong presumption of 
undue influence in cases of attorney misconduct. Such professional delinquency 
is encompassed by our official rules governing the professional ethics of 
attorneys. Our disciplinary rules cover all gradations of professional 
departures from ethical norms, and, the existence of an ethical conflict 
exemplified in this case is squarely posited under DR 5-105. * * *

* * 
* * * *

     So pervasive and 
fundamental is the ethical reach of DR 5-105 that ethical violations of this 
disciplinary rule based upon conflicts of interest have been found in a myriad 
of situations and in almost every walk of professional life. Such conflicts 
often arise where there is dual representation. * * * A conflict of interest, 
moreover, need not be obvious or actual to create an ethical impropriety. The 
mere possibility of such a conflict at the outset of the relationship is 
sufficient to establish an ethical breach on the part of the 
attorney.

See 
likewise Gillespie v. Klun, 406 N.W.2d 547 (Minn.App. 1987) in representing both 
buyer and seller in an apartment deal with resulting jury verdict for 
compensatory damages, emotional distress and punitive damages awarded to the 
buyer after defaulting on the contract in attempting to rescind.

[¶99]   The rule in Fishman v. Brooks, 396 
Mass. 643, 487 N.E.2d 1377 (1986) is applicable here where avoidance of conflict 
representation and forbearance of direct negotiations of a represented 
individual is intended to protect the potential victim from fraud, overreaching 
or execution of a unconscionable contract. The Massachusetts court 
said:

     We add a brief comment 
about the relationship between the canons of ethics and an attorney's duty of 
care to his client. A violation of a canon of ethics or a disciplinary rule * * 
*, is not itself an actionable breach of duty to a client. * * * As with 
statutes and regulations, however, if a plaintiff can demonstrate that a 
disciplinary rule was intended to protect one in his position, a violation of 
that rule may be some evidence of the attorney's negligence.

Id. 
487 N.E.2d  at 1381.

[¶100] 
I do not believe we can ignore violations of ethical responsibilities in 
assessment of liability for legal malpractice. Modern and predominate case law, 
well reasoned as it is, sustains my perception.

V.

FRAUD

[¶101] 
The majority denies that fraud is visible, although many others may see 
it without squinting, when Zebre convinced Patricia Brooks to rely on his advice 
that she need not consult the estate attorney and then secured her signature to 
an unconscionable sales contract. Fraud is not one of those elusive 
concepts.

An 
intentional perversion of truth [you do not need to 
consult your attorney because I would not cheat you] for the purpose of 
inducing another in reliance [trust me] upon it to 
part with some valuable thing [a ranch and an 
inheritance] belonging to him or to surrender a legal right.18

See 
Raymark Industries, Inc. v. Stemple, 714 F. Supp. 460 (D.Kan. 1988).19 See also Jeska v. Mulhall, 71 Or. App. 819, 693 P.2d 1335 (1985).

[¶102] 
My analysis first recognizes that this was not a pleading issue in 
district court. Significant differences in adaptation and application of the 
motion to dismiss, W.R.C.P. 12(b)(6), as different from summary judgment, 
W.R.C.P. 56, should be first noted. Dismissal under W.R.C.P. 12(b)(6) without 
leave to amend should never be granted unless there are no circumstances in 
which an amended complaint could be stated which would justify the grant of 
relief to the pleader. When a case proceeds past the motion to dismiss stage of 
summary judgment, proper adjudicatory review also proceeds past initial pleading 
to consider presented facts. Moss v. Zafiris Inc., 524 So. 2d 1010 (Fla. 1988); 
United States Nat. Bank of Oregon v. Fought, 291 Or. 201, 630 P.2d 337 
(1981).

[¶103] 
This decision can only be justified if the evidence utilized by the 
district court for summary judgment fails to present an issue. This case 
extrudes from facts so reprehensible that precedent can only be developed by 
analogy. This is a fact case, not a pleading of fraud case in presented 
posture.

[¶104] 
The attorney intentionally violated clear rules of professional conduct. 
The attorney justified contact with a represented party whose attorney was not 
advised by assurance of fairness and protection for the unrepresented 
individual. An unconscionable contract was negotiated. On this summary judgment 
record, great damage and loss resulted not only to the individual's own interest 
but to her responsibility as an officer of the court to protect other 
testamentary beneficiaries in her service as personal representative and 
co-trustee of the trust. In other words, the attorney conspired, consoled and 
participated in securing an unconscionable contract which, by excluding the 
attorney for the estate from negotiations, adversely affected not only the 
uncounseled person, but also the other heirs and beneficiaries within a pending 
probate proceeding. See Raymark Industries, Inc., 714 F. Supp. 460.

[¶105] 
In unethically excluding counsel, Crutchley, 450 N.W.2d 877, and in 
promising protection and fairness, there was fraud - raw, rank and despicable. 
The fraud to which the majority seems blind first occurred in negotiations with 
a represented person constituting an officer of the court in probate and 
contacted, in the absence of the estate's counsel, for the negotiation of an 
agreement contrary to normal administrative practices for sale of real estate 
under Wyoming law. Clearly, this alone should have been sufficient as procedural 
fraud.

[¶106] 
Consideration is then directed to the factors and functions of the 
transaction that were fraudulent in providing an unconscionable "bargain." 
Obviously, her trust was misplaced. Barbara A., 193 Cal. Rptr. 422. First, 
Patricia Brooks was led to believe that the transaction was a lease. After 
trial, the district court found she never understood the transaction even by 
that date. Secondly, the transaction was really a sales agreement with option 
rights and was absolutely unfair to the seller and favorable to the buyer. 
Imputed interest and rental features provided a tax gold mine to the buyer and 
ordinary income to the seller. Third, the price in real valuation was only about 
twenty-five percent of what Patricia Brooks thought she was receiving and in 
financing terms could hardly be distinguished from sheer larceny of the ranching 
enterprise. Fourth, the operational rights of her son on the family ranch were 
used as a price in negotiation and were overtly without expectable value in 
procedural application.20 Fifth, inadequate security was provided for 
seller's protection to justify the fiduciary responsibility of a personal 
representative and a co-trustee and within the expectancy of a negotiating party 
in order to constitute a debt encumbrance to maintain the asset and assure 
contract fulfillment in regard to both the livestock and the real estate. Sixth, 
the transaction was not a lease and was not booked out as a lease by the buyer 
when the property acquisition occurred. It was a long-term sale transaction for 
both livestock and real property with an opportunity for the buyer to credit 
payments made as rent or charge them to purchase price and walk away without 
deficiency at any time during the fifty-two year period of the transaction. 
Seventh, the so-called down payment was actually funded by a loan against the 
acquired assets. Eighth, the period of time in itself for the transaction's 
completion was unconscionable. Ninth, avoidance of interest payments on asset 
value acquired and payment obligation was fiscally absurd creating a financially 
phony sales price which fiscal facts were never really understood by the widow. 
Tenth, the contract was executed in undue haste and was not either explained to 
or understood by Patricia Brooks. Eleventh, the journeyman technician with 
reasonable real estate experience could find at least a dozen or perhaps twenty 
technical or practical questions about the form, sufficiency and handling of the 
sales agreement and sales document for this multi-million dollar integrated 
ranch sale. See Appendix "A" attached hereto.

[¶107] 
In addition to the overreaching created by the sales document itself, the 
procedural disregard when one considers the estate status of the transaction is 
staggering. An appraisal for the estate had not been obtained. Estate and 
inheritance tax considerations, let alone filed returns, had not been completed. 
Minor heirs required guardianships or at least guardians ad litem. A court 
approval would be required for the transaction. A careful inventory and 
appraisal for sales evaluation purposes was needed to compare the offer to a 
relevant market. Estate property market conditions and values needed to be 
explored and established by comprehensive and competent expert 
appraisal.

[¶108] 
None of this occurred in the hastily negotiated, oppressive agreement 
which was achieved by reliance of the victim on the protection from the attorney 
who provided an atmosphere of validity to a grossly deceptive process. Zebre was 
a principal actor and contributor in fulfillment of the transactional 
misadventure. It is most fitting and just that he should be called to explain to 
a jury to what degree his conduct did not contribute to causing the contended 
million dollar loss to the widow and minor children who, without question, were 
defrauded in the sales transaction by the "friendly, neighbor 
rancher."

[¶109] 
Within these concepts of fraud intrinsic to the process used to acquire 
the estate and what was provided as terms for acquisition, Wyoming law on fraud 
is set back by the majority's callous disregard of the obvious and, in many 
regards, uncontroverted facts.

[¶110] 
In Willmschen v. Meeker, 750 P.2d 669 (Wyo. 1988), the vendors brought action for fraud against a broker. 
Elements stated in that case are: (1) falsity of the representation; (2) guilty 
knowledge or scienter; (3) intent to deceive or cause someone to believe the 
falsehood; (4) reliance on the misrepresentation which induced the seller to 
act; (5) actual deception; and (6) injury or damage to the person victimized. We 
have recently stated the concept more simply where evidence of actionable fraud 
in a car sales transaction is found, including knowingly making a false 
representation of a material fact with the intent of inducing action and 
reliance to their detriment and damage. Britton v. Bill Anselmi 
Pontiac-Buick-GMC, Inc., 786 P.2d 855 (Wyo. 1990). See also Garner v. Hickman, 709 P.2d 407 (Wyo. 1985) 
and Duffy v. Brown, 708 P.2d 433 (Wyo. 1985). This court has further recognized that evidence of any 
active conduct or words which tend to produce any erroneous impression might 
sufficiently satisfy the burden if those half-truths had the effect of lies and 
even if no duty to speak might exist. Once the actor chooses to speak, he 
becomes obligated to fully and fairly disclose the truth of the matter. Meeker 
v. Lanham, 604 P.2d 556 (Wyo. 1979); 
Simpson v. Western National Bank of Casper, 497 P.2d 878 (Wyo. 1972); 
Twing v. Schott, 80 Wyo. 100, 338 P.2d 839 (1959). The special responsibility which we attributed to a real estate 
broker in Walter v. Moore, 700 P.2d 1219 (Wyo. 1985); Hagar v. Mobley, 638 P.2d 127 (Wyo. 1981); 
and Distad v. Cubin, 633 P.2d 167 (Wyo. 1981), surely, in augmented degree, applies to the high calling of 
the practicing attorney in professional responsibility to avoid being the 
handmaiden of the perpetration of fraud on an unrepresented individual. As 
stated in Duffy, 708 P.2d 433, we have here, false information supplied in the course of one's 
business for the guidance of others in their business and failure to exercise 
reasonable care in obtaining or relating the information and pecuniary loss 
resulting from the justified reliance thereon. This case accommodates jury 
questions of fraud in the process of perpetration and fraud in the object 
realized by perpetration. Our affirmance of the substantial verdict rendered on 
the basis of fraud in Meyer v. Ludvik, 680 P.2d 459 (Wyo. 1984) 
is in accord but not nearly within a factual circumstance as egregious as are 
the events occasioned here. See likewise Hagar, 638 P.2d 127. 

[¶111] 
Cases of closest relevance are Waters v. Trenckmann, 503 P.2d 1187 (Wyo. 1972), 
a ranch sales transaction where the representations were made by the realtor and 
the seller was held liable for the fraud and Simpson, 497 P.2d 878, where the 
representations were made by the banker regarding the solvency of the 
contracting party. Both cases would sustain a fraud complaint in this case 
within the perspective not only of the procedural fraud, but the substantive, 
negotiative fraud that occurred here and the unquestioned participation of the 
attorney in accomplishment. Although intent to deceive must be proven by clear 
and convincing evidence, appropriate proof of such intent may be inferred from 
circumstantial evidence. The facts of this transaction speak for themselves. 
Broom v. State, 695 P.2d 640 (Wyo. 1985); 
In re Kimzey, 761 F.2d 421, 424 (7th Cir. 1985); United States v. Mammoth Oil Co., 14 F.2d 705 (8th Cir. 1926), cert. granted 273 U.S. 686, 47 S. Ct. 332, 71 L. Ed. 840, aff'd 275 U.S. 13, 48 S. Ct. 1, 
72 L. Ed. 137 (1927); In re Eversole, 110 B.R. 318, 323 (S.D.Ohio 
1990).

[¶112] 
The civil fraud case of Hennigan, 593 S.W.2d 380 is informative in 
recognizing where a duty to speak exists, silence may be equally misleading. 
Here, the fraud began by excluding an attorney from his client who was an 
officer of the court by virtue of being the personal representative of an 
estate. The substantive elements of fraud result from the negotiations of the 
unconscionable contract. It is similar to Hennigan where the attorney permitted 
execution processes to continue after he had already collected. By such 
misfeasance, the Texas attorney became responsible for damages sustained by the 
third party as a result of his fraud. In Hennigan, 593 S.W.2d  at 383, the 
appellate court considered the appellant's argument:

Appellant's arguments as we understand them are: (1) If an 
attorney at law violates his professional responsibility by concealing facts 
where there is a duty to reveal them, there is no private remedy by way of a 
cause of action against him for fraud, but rather the remedy is a public one by 
way of professional disciplinary procedures as under the State Bar Act. 
Appellant has cited us no authority to support such a proposition, and we have 
found none. We see no reason why an attorney at law could not be held liable for 
actionable fraud as would anyone else. We reject this argument.

[¶113] 
A fraud case was clearly presented here and, in denial of that right to 
the defrauded estate, the district court and this majority committed a terrible 
error.

VI.

CONCLUSION

[¶114] 
We leave this case as we began. A grossly unconscionable contract was 
negotiated with an untrained, modestly educated, recently widowed woman after 
she was talked into excluding her attorney. A direct participant was an attorney 
who purported to protect her in a hurriedly negotiated transaction while 
violating fundamental professional ethics by ensuring that her attorney, who 
could have protected the widow, was not available. The majority is totally wrong 
in all three major conclusions utilized to deny relief to the defrauded estate - 
(1) a privity defense; (2) non-application of ethical responsibilities to a duty 
of care; and (3) proper presentation of a fraudulent claim. Contrary to 
statements made by Zebre's counsel at oral argument before this court (whether 
actually representing his interest or otherwise) that justice should be found 
through disciplinary proceedings (which could include disbarment), I see in this 
case a responsibility for compensation in damage done. Anything else is not real 
justice to the defrauded estate and its beneficiaries and, consequently, I most 
strongly and with great anguish dissent.

APPENDIX A

EXHIBIT 1

MEMORANDUM CONTRACT OF SALE AND LEASE AGREEMENT WITH OPTION 
TO PURCHASE

THIS 
Memorandum Contract of Sale and Lease Agreement with Option to Purchase made 
this 12th day of August, 1983, by and between Patricia A. Brooks, as an 
individual; Patricia A. Brooks, as personal representative of the estate of 
Isaac N. Brooks; and Patricia A. Brooks and Saima McCurtain, as trustees of the 
trusts established under the Last Will and Testament of Isaac N. Brooks, 
hereinafter referred to as sellers, lessors and/or optionors, and John F. 
Arambel and Peter R. Arambel, hereinafter referred to as buyers, lessees and/or 
optionees, all of Rock Springs, Sweetwater County, Wyoming.

            
IT IS MUTUALLY UNDERSTOOD AND AGREED THAT:

            
The covenants herein contained shall bind, and the benefits and 
advantages thereof shall inure to, the respective heirs, devisees, legatees, 
executors, administrators, successors and assigns of the parties hereto. 
Whenever used the singular number shall include the plural, the plural the 
singular, and the use of any gender shall include all genders.

SALE 
OF LIVESTOCK

            
1. Sellers herein agree to sell and buyers agree to buy certain livestock 
owned by the sellers identified as follows: Commencing on approximately 
September 15, 1983, the buyers will assist the sellers in the round-up, 
handling, and culling of all livestock presently owned by sellers, commonly 
known as all of that livestock involved in the Isaac N. Brooks ranching 
operation. Sellers will sell pursuant to said handling operations with the 
assistance of the buyers all of this year's calf and lamb crop, together with 
all culled livestock, and shall retain all sale proceeds therefrom.

            
2. All remaining livestock shall be purchased by the buyers for the then 
market value of the same, said market value being determined by the price that 
buyers receive from the sale of the livestock presently owned by the Circle L 
ranching operation owned by buyers. The purchase price for said livestock 
purchased from sellers by buyers shall be paid to the sellers over a 10-year 
period in 10 equal annual payments with the first of such annual payments being 
due to sellers on December 1, 1984.

            
3. It is understood that of the $50,000.00 initial deposit and payment 
made with this agreement, $10,000.00 of the same is hereby allocated as earnest 
money toward the purchase of said livestock. It is mutually and expressly 
understood and agreed that the indebtedness of the buyers to the sellers for the 
purchase of said livestock and the installment payments made pursuant thereto 
shall not bear interest.

LEASE

            
1. The lessors, as the same are identified in the introductory paragraph 
hereto, for and in consideration of the covenants herein contained, hereby 
demise and lease to the lessees all of the real property and real property 
interests of whatsoever kind and character presently owned by or known as the 
Isaac N. Brooks ranching operation, together with all improvements and 
appurtenances, all water and/or ditch rights, and all equipment, trucks, 
machinery, tools, saddlery and tack presently involved with or associated with 
said ranching operation, save and except that white Chevrolet 1-ton truck 
presently utilized by Dean Smith, as the foreman and superintendent of said 
ranching operation, and also together with all deeded lands, all state and/or 
federal leases, and private and/or corporate leases, to include sellers', 
lessors' and optionors' shares in the Rock Springs Grazing Association, all of 
which property is situate in Sweetwater County, Wyoming. This description is not 
meant or intended to include any non-agricultural property located within 
municipal limits of Rock Springs, Wyoming, but does include any and all 
buildings, structures, residences or appurtenances situate on or about the 
aforementioned and described agricultural lands. Sellers reserve any and all 
mineral rights and royalties.

            
2. It is mutually understood and agreed between the parties hereto that 
the exact legal description of said tracts herein leased shall be determined by 
buyers and sellers, at the expense of buyers, obtaining a title search from 
Wyoming Land Title Company of the records of any appropriate federal or state 
agency or entity. It is expressly understood and agreed that the above and 
aforementioned inventory approach is taken only because of the extensive size 
and nature of the land holdings, and not because sellers or buyers are unaware 
of the exact lands being leased herein.

            
3. The term of the aforementioned lease shall be from November 1, 1983, 
for a period of 40 years, up through and including October 31, 2023. The lease 
payments pursuant hereto shall be paid as follows:

a. 
For the first 5 years in the amount of $43,750.00 per year, payable on December 
1, 1984, and on the 1st day of December of each and every year thereafter for a 
total period of 5 years.

b. 
For the next 30 years in the amount of $87,500.00 per year, payable on December 
1, 1989, and on the 1st day of December of each and every year thereafter for a 
total period of 30 years.

c. 
For the last 5 years of said lease in the amount of $131,250.00, payable on 
December 1, 2019, and on the 1st day of December of each and every year 
thereafter for a total period of 5 years when said lease amount shall have been 
paid in full, subject, however, to the provisions of the option hereinafter 
recited.

4. 
It is understood and agreed between the parties hereto that of the $50,000.00 
deposit and initial payment made herewith that the sum of $20,000.00 shall be 
considered as consideration for the execution of said lease 
agreement.

OPTION TO PURCHASE

            
1. The optionors and optionees, as identified in the introductory 
paragraph hereto, hereby mutually and expressly agree, in exchange for their 
mutual promises and covenants and the balance of $20,000.00 remaining 
consideration paid herewith, that the optionors hereby grant to the optionees an 
exclusive option to purchase all of the lands hereinabove described as being 
subject to the lease provisions of this agreement by notifying the optionors of 
optionees intention to so purchase the same. In the event said option is 
exercised, the optionees shall give the optionors notice of the same in writing. 
In the event said option is exercised, it is agreed that the purchase price for 
the same shall be in the amount of $3,500,000.00, which will be paid by the 
optionees to the optionors and sellers in the same amount, manner and rate and 
on the same schedule as the lease payments made hereunder, and optionees shall 
be accorded credit against the purchase price thus paid for all lease payments 
made to the lessors prior to the exercise of said option, it being understood 
and agreed that the total of said lease payments over a 40-year period is equal 
to the total consideration in the event of exercise of said option in the amount 
of $3,500,000.00. In the event said option is exercised, the remaining payments 
to be made toward payment of the full purchase shall also be without interest. 
It is further mutually and expressly understood and agreed that in addition to 
the credits previously referred to hereinabove the initial payment and deposit 
made contemporaneously with the execution of this agreement shall be credited 
towards the payment of the purchase price by deducting the same amount from the 
last payment due and owing to sellers in the year 2023, notwithstanding any 
provision to the contrary herein.

            
2. It is mutually and expressly understood and agreed between the parties 
hereto that the purchase price for said ranching operation of $3,500,000.00 has 
been determined at the rate of $2,000.00 per 1,750 animal units, with the 
sellers and optionors having retained the right for Isaac N. Brooks, Jr., at 
such time as he shall have attained the age of 19 years and for a period of 3 
years thereafter, to exercise the retained right to run and operate 500 animal 
units on the lands purchased herein by the optionees and/or buyers. In the event 
Isaac N. Brooks, Jr., exercises his right to run and operate said 500 animal 
units, the area or areas on which said animal units are run shall be at the 
discretion of the optionees and buyers herein, and that the optionees and buyers 
may elect to simply have said animal units run in common with those of optionees 
and buyers, it being understood between the parties hereto that the term 500 
animal units refers to the ability to run 500 cows year round. In the event the 
said Isaac N. Brooks, Jr., does not attain the age of 19 years or in the event 
that he elects not to exercise his right to run said 500 animal unit operation, 
the optionees herein shall be entitled to purchase said 500 animal units from 
the optionors for the purchase price of $1,000,000.00, to be paid to optionors 
at the rate of $87,500.00 per year, which payments shall be made by the 
optionees to the optionors commencing December 1, 2024, and thereafter on the 
1st day of December of each and every year to and including December 1, 
2036.

            
3. It is further mutually and expressly understood and agreed that until 
such time as Isaac N. Brooks, Jr., shall have attained the age of 19 years, the 
lessees, buyers and optionees herein shall be entitled to run and operate the 
additional 500 animal units at no additional cost, expense or charge to the 
lessees, optionees, or buyers hereunder.

            
4. It is mutually and expressly agreed that the estate of Isaac N. 
Brooks, Sr., is presently believed to be in probate, and that the sellers, 
lessors and optionors herein will utilize their maximum efforts to direct and 
obtain any necessary or required and appropriate confirmation of these 
agreements by the probate court having appropriate jurisdiction.

            
5. The parties to this agreement mutually and expressly contemplate and 
agree that in the event said option is exercised to purchase the lands described 
herein, it being the understanding of the parties that it is the intent of the 
optionees to do so, this memorandum contemplates and envisions the execution and 
delivery into escrow of all appropriate warranty deeds, assignments of leases, 
bills of sale, promissory notes, expanded or more elaborate contract documents 
and any appropriate security instruments and the establishment of a set of 
escrow instructions to provide for the mutual security of both parties 
hereto.

            
6. It is further understood and agreed that the provisions of the lease 
and option as set forth hereinabove shall include a lease to the lessees or sale 
to the optionees of all brands and/or earmarks presently involved in said 
ranching operation, save and except the MU brand, which shall be retained by the 
sellers, lessors and optionors for the future use of Isaac N. Brooks, Jr., in 
the event he should exercise his right to run and operate 500 animal units. In 
the event the option to purchase said 500 animal units is exercised by the 
optionees, then the MU brand shall be assigned and transferred to the optionees 
and buyers.

            
7. Actual possession of the real property, improvements and 
appurtenances, water and/or ditch rights and all equipment, trucks, machinery, 
tools, saddlery and tack shall be delivered to buyers, lessees and optionees on 
November 1, 1983.

            
8. In the event of buyers', lessees' and optionees' failure to seasonably 
complete the terms and conditions of this offer, it is mutually agreed that 
sellers, lessors and optionors may elect to either retain the deposit made 
herewith as fixed and liquidated damages for buyers', lessees' and optionees' 
failure to complete the sale as herein provided, or enforce specific performance 
of this agreement. In the event of sellers', lessors' and optionors' failure to 
seasonably complete the terms and conditions of this offer, it is mutually 
agreed that buyers, lessees and optionees may enforce specific performance of 
this agreement.

SELLERS, LESSORS and OPTIONORS:

/s/ 
Patricia A. Brooks

Patricia A. Brooks, as an individual

/s/ 
Patricia A. Brooks

Patricia A. Brooks, as personal representative of the 
estate of Isaac N. Brooks

/s/ 
Patricia A. Brooks

Patricia A. Brooks, as a trustee under the Last Will and 
Testament of Isaac N. Brooks 

/s/ 
Saima McCurtain

Saima McCurtain, as a trustee under the Last Will and 
Testament of Isaac N. Brooks

APPENDIX B

EXCERPT FROM DISTRICT COURT'S DECISION LETTER FILED APRIL 
8, 1985

            
What then is wrong with the contract, if anything?

            
1. It purports to be a lease. Therefore each lease payment would be 
treated as ordinary income for tax purposes and if this estate has the income, 
which it would appear to have by virtue of the lease, it probably would be in a 
fairly high tax bracket meaning much of the income would go for taxes. The 
Arambels would be able to deduct all lease payments as business 
expenses.

            
2. When the option is exercised, and it was on September 23, 1983, the 
contract became a contract of sale without interest. Therefore, the IRS would 
impute 10% interest a year compounded semi-annually to each payment so that the 
estate would have to pay tax on that interest as ordinary income and the 
Arambels could deduct it as a business expense.

            
3. Taking the contract as of the day it was executed, it is clear that 
the Arambels could have waited until the last day of the full forty years of the 
lease and could have continued to deduct the lease payments as business expenses 
and the estate would have to declare them as ordinary income, thereby 
effectively depriving the estate of the opportunity to treat the payments as 
long term capital gains rather than as ordinary income.

            
4. The option provides that "the area or areas on which said animal units 
are run shall be at the discretion and control of the" Arambels if Isaac, Jr. 
exercises his option. He has nothing to say about it at all.

            
5. The option states the Arambels "shall be entitled" to buy the 500 
A.U.M.'s if the option is not exercised. They are not obligated to buy them. 
Therefore, as I understand it, Isaac, Jr. would be sitting there with 500 
A.U.M.'s with no base property to attach them to - either federal, state, fee, 
or grazing association land, and, as will be noted later, would probably forever 
remain that position.

            
6. The Arambels would have from five to eight years to use the 500 
A.U.M.'s free of charge until Isaac exercised his option, if ever.

            
7. Despite the assurances by the Arambels that Isaac, Jr. would be a 
partner with them, that is not the case. Nowhere in the contract was that 
assurance ever provided for or made good.

            
8. The contract to be performed over a great period of time - between 40 
and 52 years - probably through the lifetime of two generations - Mrs. Brooks 
and possibly even her children, and particularly Isaac, Jr.

            
9. John Arambel testified that what he told Mrs. Brooks meant nothing - 
that only the contract itself mattered.

            
10. The entire transaction was completed with inordinate haste at the 
principal insistence of John Arambel, the basic documents were prepared by the 
Arambels, and Mrs. Brooks, as nearly as I can tell, was not consulted as far as 
those basic documents were concerned. It also seems unusual to me that no effort 
was made by the Arambels to buy at a lesser price. Generally, in my experience, 
there is always some dickering or "horse trading" done, but not 
here.

            
11. Although five of the ultimate beneficiaries of this estate were 
juveniles when the contract was made, and four of them still are, no guardian 
was ever appointed for them and no one represented them in any way except for 
the feeble and probably futile attempt to protect Isaac, Jr. Furthermore, no one 
ever suggested that a guardian be appointed for them.

            
12. Mrs. Brooks had no professional advice of any kind. She discussed the 
matter with her children, her brother, Mrs. McCurtain and Mr. Smith. None of 
them knew any more than she did about the legal effects of the contract. Mr. 
Smith knew the manual aspect of operating a ranch, but nothing of the legal 
aspects.

            
13. Despite the fact that Mrs. Brooks purported to understand the 
contract when it was signed, I am convinced that she did not have the faintest 
idea of its significance. The Arambels and Zebre make much of the fact that she 
insisted on retaining the mineral rights, indicating her understanding of the 
terms of the contract, but I submit that was probably something she had heard 
her husband say at one time or another and it stuck in her mind. I perceived her 
as intellectually backward and incapable of understanding. The contract was 
signed on August 12, a Friday, and on August 14, a Monday, Zebre took the 
contract to Galen West and asked him to have the contract confirmed. West was 
concerned because he had not been consulted and when he talked to Mrs. Brooks, 
he stated she was confused. Each time he talked to her he thought she was 
"extremely confused" about the meaning of the "lease" as she kept calling the 
contract. After West explained to her the magnitude of what she had done, she 
said she wanted out. West also explained what she should do but she never 
authorized him to do anything. Even after he explained the contract to her, West 
thought she knew something was wrong with the deal but she continued to be 
confused as to what she should do. West told Zebre that Mrs. Brooks wanted the 
contract changed, but Zebre said his clients were satisfied so if she wanted 
changes, she should suggest them, but she never authorized him to do anything, 
as noted above. Mrs. Brooks testified that West told her the contract made him 
sick to his stomach. She also saw two other attorneys who told her the contract 
was bad but she did not hire them and later saw Mr. White who finally filed his 
Petition in probate on November 13, 1984, approximately one year after the 
Arambels took possession of the ranch. Mrs. Brooks obviously had great faith in 
John Arambel and an honest belief that he would take care of her. Hers was a 
faith beyond mere friendship as I perceived it - he was, in her eyes, acting 
almost in a fiduciary capacity. Because of her faith in him and because of her 
lack of intellectual perception, I believe Mrs. Brooks was in a state of 
confusion for well over a year after the contract was signed, despite the fact 
that three attorneys had told her the contract was bad and not in the best 
interests of Her or the estate. her own actions in the manner in which she spent 
the down payment, and proceeds from the sale of the animal livestock crop and 
culls, and in the manner in which she let the city property deteriorate to the 
point of destruction is further evidence of her confused state and inability to 
control the estate affairs.

            
14. Although the contract purports to "protect" Isaac, Jr. by giving him 
the option of running his 500 A.U.M.'s on the ranch, it is obvious to me that he 
is not now, nor will he ever able to be, capable of running anything. He is a 
frail, sickly boy who cannot even walk straight and who appears also mentally 
retarded, all as a result of his many ailments and operations. It is difficult, 
if not impossible, for me to comprehend how anyone with any degree of 
perspicacity could think otherwise. Frankly, it is questionable that Isaac, Jr. 
will live long enough to exercise the option, and even the contract recognizes 
that possibility where it gives the Arambels the right to buy the 500 A.U.M.'s 
if Isaac, Jr. "does not attain the age of 19 years."

            
15. Although the Buyers insist that by virtue of Section 2-7-609, no 
court confirmation of the sale was necessary if a power of sale is given in the 
will, it is evident that confirmation was contemplated in view of the fact that 
Zebre asked West to get the contract confirmed and also asked how long it would 
take to do this.

            
16. Had the ranch been sold for cash, or even on an installment sale over 
a short period to lessen the tax aspects, and even at the value of $1,650,000.00 
placed on it by the Arambels' appraiser, that money could be invested now in 
such a manner as to give the estate a return far greater than this contract 
does. Furthermore, what will be the value of a dollar 40 to 52 years in the 
future if inflation continues at even the present comparatively low rate?

FOOTNOTES

1 The 
travail of the Brooks estate did not end with entry of the June 21, 1985 
judgment requiring reconveyance because the judgment provided for management 
payments to the Arambels including a reasonable fee for management during the 
litigative period from execution of the sales agreement to litigation 
conclusion. The Arambels' accountant detailed ownership of a number of ranching 
operations, and submitted a billing for management of this family ranch of 
$12,000 a month, $5,000 for John, $5,000 for Peter, and $2,000 for Mary Arambel 
for the period to total somehow $216,000 plus another item, 1985 management and 
selling commissions of $108,000 to total $324,000 for the family ranch for less 
than two years. The original total claimed for expenses of ranch operation, part 
of which was interest on the initial down payment of $50,000, was $808,286 which 
was apparently settled out for $440,000 cash payment. Never let it be said that 
fraud does not necessarily pay. At the time that these individuals were billing 
$12,000 a month for ranch management, their other business entities included 
Midland Livestock Company, Dunten Sheep Company, Grey's River Livestock Company, 
Circle L Cattle Company and the Brooks Ranch, which was operated as a 
partnership under the name of Pretty Water Livestock Company. In addition, Peter 
Arambel, at some time, also had a separate ranching operation.

2 The 
only mitigating factor in this course of events was that when the estate's 
attorney was advised that the estate property had been sold out from under him, 
the attorney was unable to convince the defrauded person to take action at that 
time. Where the Wyoming State Bar in its disciplinary obligations and procedures 
was during this entire course of events is not disclosed. As a matter of 
judicial fact and notice, serious reprimand, or possibly disbarment, should have 
occurred but did not. Whether complaint was made and why appropriate action was 
not taken are questions to which answers are not provided.

The 
seriousness of an attorney's conduct when negotiating an unsupportable deal 
directly with another attorney's client is surely not unknown to the Wyoming 
State Bar grievance organization.

3 
This sales agreement and the sixteen point response by the district court judge 
is attached as Appendix "A" and Appendix "B".

Patricia Brooks, co-trustee and heir, thought the sale 
price was about $4.5 million. Actually, the agreement allowed a $50,000 down 
payment and no interest to acquire livestock over ten years and what was in 
reality an open option of at least forty years to purchase the ranch property 
for $3.5 million with rental payments credited to purchase. Assuming a constant 
$87,500 per year payment, which is unlikely of course, and a term over fifty 
years, not the fifty-two years as was possible under the agreement, the net 
value of the sales agreement for livestock, equipment and land interests as of 
the date of the execution of August 12, 1983 was less than $1 million and, 
quickly amortized, perhaps about $900,000 in consideration that an amortized 
payment to purchase the ranch for $4.5 million with annual payments and interest 
at a modest ten percent would require an annual payment to total $453,114 rather 
than the $87,500 which was provided.

4 
"`[W]e follow, * * *, the accepted rule that a complaint should not be dismissed 
for failure to state a claim unless it appears beyond doubt that the plaintiff 
can prove no set of facts in support of his claim which would entitled him to 
relief.'" Fiscus v. Atlantic Richfield Co., 742 P.2d 198, 202 (Wyo. 
1987) (quoting Conley v. Gibson, 355 U.S. 41, 45-46, 78 S. Ct. 99, 102, 2 L. Ed. 2d 80 (1957)).

"The 
12(b)(6) motion addresses itself solely to the failure of the complaint to state 
a claim and is not designed to correct inartistic pleadings * * *." Wright & 
Miller, Federal Practice and Procedure: Civil § 1356 at 590 (1969).

The 
Rule 12(b)(6) motion also must be distinguished from a motion for summary 
judgment under Rule 56, which goes to the merits of the claim and is designed to 
test whether there is a genuine issue of material fact. The Rule 12(b)(6) 
motion, * * *, only tests whether the claim has been adequately stated in the 
complaint."

Id. 
at 592. "Technically * * *, a post-answer Rule 12(b)(6) motion is untimely and 
some other vehicle, such as a motion for judgment on the pleadings or for 
summary judgment, must be used to challenge the failure to state a claim for 
relief." Id. at 593.

Our 
case law under Savage v. Town of Lander, 77 Wyo. 157, 309 P.2d 152, 156 (1957); 
Lore v. Town of Douglas, 355 P.2d 367 (Wyo. 1960); and Bruch v. Benedict, 62 Wyo. 213, 165 P.2d 561 (1946), 
requires we consider this appeal on the facts upon which the district court made 
its decision and not whether the technical attack on the original pleading may 
or may not have been successful.

5 
Crutchley v. First Trust and Savings Bank, 450 N.W.2d 877 (Iowa 1990) is similar 
but involves a real estate broker. The transaction involved a non-recourse real 
estate sales contract which plaintiff alleged was inadequately explained before 
execution, resulting in a large loss after default. Both contract and negligence 
claims were based upon (1) inadequate and incomplete explanation of the 
contractual provisions; (2) failure to affirmatively recommend use of 
independent counsel by the sellers; (3) "in discouraging plaintiffs from seeking 
legal counsel," the realtor's code of ethics provisions were admitted into 
evidence as proof of the violation of the ethical standard as evidence upon 
which a finding of fact of negligence could be made. Id. at 880. With disputed 
evidence of what had been said about independent counsel, a trial resulted in 
judgment against the realtors of $536,250, which the Iowa Supreme Court affirmed 
on both a breach of listing contract theory and a tort professional negligence 
theory. Id. at 879. Except what was done to Patricia Brooks is more egregious 
since independent counsel existed, she was a court officer as personal 
representative (administratrix) and the defendant was an attorney, this case 
provides a very comparable factual comparison.

6 
Wyoming's Rules of Professional Conduct for Attorneys at Law 4.2 
states:

In 
representing a client, a lawyer shall not communicate about the subject of the 
representation with a party the lawyer knows to be represented by another lawyer 
in the matter, unless the lawyer has the consent of the other lawyer or is 
authorized by law to do so.

This 
present rule was adopted by order of the Wyoming Supreme Court on November 7, 
1986. Disciplinary rules in effect in August 1983, at the date when the conduct 
occurred, were the same as the historical national standard, DR 7-104, 
Communicating With One of Adverse Interest, which states:

(A) 
During the course of his representation of a client a lawyer shall 
not:

(1) 
Communicate or cause another to communicate on the subject of the representation 
with a party he knows to be represented by a lawyer in that matter unless he has 
the prior consent of the lawyer representing such other party or is authorized 
by law to do so;

(2) 
Give advice to a person who is not represented by a lawyer, other than the 
advice to secure counsel, if the interests of such person are or have a 
reasonable possibility of being in conflict with the interests of his 
client.

7 
Widows seem to be fair game in Wyoming adjudicatory history. Cf. Matter of 
Hartt's Estate, 75 Wyo. 305, 295 P.2d 985 (1956); Hartt v. Brimmer, 74 Wyo. 338, 287 P.2d 638 (1955); and 
Delfelder v. Poston, 42 Wyo. 176, 293 P. 354 (Wyo. 1930).

8 
Also disregarded is Restatement (Second) of Torts § 552 (1977).

(1) 
One who, in the course of his business, profession or employment, or in any 
other transaction in which he has a pecuniary interest, supplies false 
information for the guidance of others in their business transactions, is 
subject to liability for pecuniary loss caused to them by their justifiable 
reliance upon the information, if he fails to exercise reasonable care or 
competence in obtaining or communicating the information.

(2) 
Except as stated in Subsection (3), the liability stated in Subsection (1) is 
limited to loss suffered

(a) 
by the person or one of a limited group of persons for whose benefit and 
guidance he intends to supply the information or knows that the recipient 
intends to supply it; and

(b) 
through reliance upon it in a transaction that he intends the information to 
influence or knows that the recipient so intends or in a substantially similar 
transaction.

(3) 
The liability of one who is under a public duty to give the information extends 
to loss suffered by any of the class of persons for whose benefit the duty is 
created, in any of the transactions in which it is intended to protect 
them.

Id. 
at 126-27. See First Florida Bank v. Max Mitchell & Co., 558 So. 2d 9 (Fla. 
1990). See also Eisenberg v. Gagnon, 766 F.2d 770 (3rd Cir. 1985), where Restatement (Second) of Torts, supra, § 552 was 
applied to the attorney in a tax shelter securities case involving negligent 
misrepresentation; and Stinson v. Brand, 738 S.W.2d 186 (Tenn. 1987), the sole 
attorney real estate transaction case.

9 
Whether apocryphal, the "trust me" status of these negotiations provides 
comparison to the attorney-client status in Barbara A. v. John G., 145 Cal. App. 3d 369, 193 Cal. Rptr. 422 (1983). In that case, the attorney told his 
female client that "I can't possibly get anyone pregnant.'" Id. 193 Cal. Rptr.  at 
426. She accepted and found that he could and she, in result, suffered a tubal 
pregnancy from which she sustained permanent injury. The judgment on the 
pleadings granted to the attorney by the trial court was reversed on appeal 
despite California's "anti-heart balm" statute. The court reasoned that the 
requested trust, followed by reliance on the attorney's sterility, was badly 
misplaced and with injuries sustained, claim for damage in deceit as well as 
battery was appropriate. Within application of the factual scenario, elements 
for a properly pleaded claim for damage from misplaced trust 
included:

In 
pleading a cause of action for deceit, a plaintiff must specifically plead the 
following elements: (1) a false representation (ordinarily of a fact) made by 
the defendant; (2) knowledge or belief on the part of the defendant that the 
representation is false, or that the representation was made by defendant 
without reasonable grounds for believing its truth; (3) an intention to induce 
the plaintiff to act or to refrain from action in reliance upon the 
misrepresentation; (4) justifiable reliance upon the representation by the 
plaintiff; (5) damage to the plaintiff, resulting from such 
reliance.

Id. 
at 427.

All 
being properly pleaded, a claim was stated to assert liability against the 
non-sterile attorney who asked her to "trust me."

10 
Compare the statement in the conclusion, to be applied here, in Cifu, Expanding 
Legal Malpractice to Nonclient Third Parties - At What Cost?, 23 Colum.J.L. 
& Soc.Probs. 1, 24 (1989):

Limiting malpractice liability to an attorney's own client 
will encourage better lawyering and will avoid many ethical and practical 
problems. This rule will force third parties to retain their own counsel to 
zealously represent their interests, rather than relying upon the attorneys for 
an adverse party.

See 
also Ellmann, Lawyering For Justice in a Flawed Democracy, 90 Colum.L.Rev. 116 
(1990). It is accurate to assess that today no longer is it true "the lawyer's 
enterprise had remained virtually an island in negligence law." Probert & 
Hendricks, Lawyer Malpractice: Duty Relationships Beyond Contract, 55 Notre Dame 
Law. 708, 708 (1980).

11 If 
the attorney who represents the estate can be liable to the beneficiaries of the 
estate for negligence, the attorney who participates in commission of a fraud 
against the estate by excluding the estate's attorney should also be liable to 
the beneficiary.

Nebraska appears as one of the strongest remaining hold 
outs in preservation of a privity non-liability rule to the damaged 
beneficiaries when a will was negligently prepared. St. Mary's Church of 
Schuyler v. Tomek, 212 Neb. 728, 325 N.W.2d 164 (1982). Ames Bank, 287 N.W.2d 687 held there was no duty to the guarantors for his client. Landrigan, 420 N.W.2d 313.

12 
"There will always be those lawyers who negligently [or tortiously] perform 
their services, and it is those persons, rather than innocent third parties, 
upon whom courts are beginning to place the loss for the lawyer's negligence." 
Note, supra, 21 Wn.burn L.J. at 71.

13 I 
do not accept the limited efficacy ascribed to the cannons of conduct after 
adoption by this court as ascribed by Wolfram, The Code of Professional 
Responsibility as a Measure of Attorney Liability in Civil Litigation, 30 
S.C.L.Rev. 281 (1979).

A 
legal savant has been quoted as saying that the lawyer obtains as much precise 
direction from his guide to professional responsibility as a heart surgeon could 
usefully derive from an examination of a valentine.

Id. 
at 281. I prefer his conclusion:

As 
the preceding sections have attempted to demonstrate, misalignments exist 
between the scope of an attorney's responsibilities under the Code of 
Professional Responsibility and the attorney's more limited liability under 
private law. The judicial expansion of attorney liability proposed in this 
article is hardly gratuitous, but is impelled by both strong theoretical 
considerations and the vital practical goal of enhancing enforcement of the Code 
of Professional Responsibility. To date, the judicial response to opportunities 
for this kind of enhanced enforcement of the Code has been, frankly, too 
grudging. * * * But it is believed that pressures from the public and from 
within the legal profession for higher standards, better articulated and more 
effectively enforced, may well prevail.

Id. 
at 319. Cf. Medina & Coyle, Texas Disciplinary Rules of Professional 
Conduct: Additional Liability for Texas Lawyers?, 21 St. Mary's L.J. 733 (1990). 
See an expressive and thoughtful consideration in Greengard, Lawyer Discipline 
Today, 17 Barrister 11, 36 (Spring 1990), which concludes with a quote from a 
Washington legal reform group, "HALT":

"The 
only thing the public wants is fairness and a feeling that they are being 
protected from unscrupulous lawyers. That is sorely lacking in the 
system."

14 
Ethics violations involving either undisclosed or inadequately protected joint 
representation cases are well represented in both discipline and liability 
litigation. Those proceedings surely include significantly less immorality and 
legal ethics violation than compared to the attorney who knowingly advises a 
represented third person not to use the assistance of retained counsel so that 
negotiations can be pursued with the resulting unassisted victim. Comprehensive 
case research has not revealed any case which directly includes the impropriety 
demonstrated here. However, conflict representation cases where disciplinary 
action is taken abound. See Annotation, What Constitutes Representation of 
Conflicting Interests Subjecting Attorney to Disciplinary Action, 17 A.L.R.3d 
835 (1968). See also, Annotation, Malpractice: Liability of Attorney 
Representing Conflicting Interests, 28 A.L.R.3d 389 (1969). Recent cases 
involving property sales or business transactions relating to disciplinary 
action taken include In Re Kamp, 40 N.J. 588, 194 A.2d 236 (1963). In In Re 
Kamp, the action of the attorney representing the vendor but then purporting to 
represent the purchaser resulted in a reprimand where the court stated in 
considering the conflicting representation:

The 
practice shown by the facts in this case is subversive of the professional 
relation of attorney and client and cannot be tolerated no matter how widespread 
it may be. However, under the circumstances, and since this is the first case in 
which this practice has been brought to our attention, we do not think it 
appropriate to impose any penalty upon the respondent other than to reprimand 
him for his conduct. This, however, is not to be taken as a measure of future 
discipline. The bar will, of course, be upon full notice that the practices here 
condemned are regarded as highly unprofessional, and any further violations 
which come to the attention of the court will therefore necessarily be dealt 
with severely.

In 
Re Kamp, 194 A.2d  at 242.

See 
Matter of Kali, 116 Ariz. 285, 569 P.2d 227 (1977), arranging loan between clients without dual notification, DR 
5-105(A) through (C) violation, two year suspension; The Florida Bar v. Clark, 
513 So. 2d 1052 (Fla. 1987), representing seller and creating the impression of 
representing the buyer, violation of DR 5-105(A) and (B), prior disciplinary 
problems, now disbarred; State v. Callahan, 232 Kan. 136, 652 P.2d 708 (1982), buyer and seller representation, indefinite suspension; In Re 
Grorud, 84 Mont. 221, 275 P. 1098 (1929), representing estate and arranging for sale to a buyer who was a 
client plus apparently keeping the minimal sales price received "for his own 
use," one year suspension for involvement in a conflict representation; In Re 
Lanza, 65 N.J. 347, 322 A.2d 445 (1974), representation of both buyer and seller 
reprimand, DR 5-105 violation; In Re Conduct of Griffith, 304 Or. 575, 748 P.2d 86 (1987), complex conflict and other problems in mortgage lending and bank 
activities, disbarred; In Re Conduct of Vaile, 300 Or. 91, 707 P.2d 52 (1985), conflict in representation on business sale, sixty day 
suspension; In Re Conduct of Moore, 299 Or. 496, 703 P.2d 961 (1985), multiple party representation business purchase, two year 
suspension; In Re Boivin, 271 Or. 419, 533 P.2d 171 (1975), buyer and seller representation without adequate disclosure, 
reprimand; In Re Hall, 73 Wn.2d 401, 438 P.2d 874 (1968), vendor school district property sales conflict, disbarred. A 
litany of twenty-one Oregon conflict representation cases in only seven years 
was enumerated in In Re Conduct of Boyer, 295 Or. 624, 669 P.2d 326 (1983). See also In Re Conduct of Bishop, 297 Or. 479, 686 P.2d 350 (1984) and Annotation, supra, 17 A.L.R.3d 835.

15 An 
interesting anomaly to all of this is provided by Cross v. American Country 
Insurance Company, 875 F.2d 625 (7th Cir. 1989), when the attorney sued the 
insurance company for intentional interference with a contractual relationship 
by ex parte settlement with the client by whom the attorney had been retained on 
a contingent fee basis. The attorney received judgment, including punitive 
damages, after the major defense failed that the written contingent fee 
agreement did not comply in all regards with a court-adopted rule. The egregious 
conduct which produced the compensatory and punitive recovery was action of the 
insurance adjuster in telling the represented 
client

that 
he did not need a lawyer and that litigation takes a long time, the company, 
acting through its agents, intentionally and maliciously induced him to breach 
his contractual relationship with Cross. See [Employers Liab. Assurance Corp. 
v.] Freeman, 229 F.2d [547] at 550 [(10th Cir. 1955)] (court found sufficient 
evidence that insurance company induced breach of contract where insurer's claim 
adjuster told client that he did not need an attorney and that the company could 
take care of everything); * * *. Taking the evidence in its entirety, we believe 
that there were sufficient facts to enable the jury to conclude that the company 
obtained a settlement with Patterson by inducing him to abandon his attorney and 
to settle directly with the company.

Id. 
at 631.

16 The 
related subject of the ex parte contact by defense counsel with opposing 
litigant's physicians has a recent litigative history of considerable attention. 
See Duquette v. Superior Court In and For County of Maricopa, 161 Ariz. 269, 778 P.2d 634 (1989).

17 
Challenging and also striking in comprehensive analysis of the eight problems in 
applied legal ethics is Miller, The Standards of Advocacy: Changing Positions in 
Legal Ethics in the United States, 16 W.St.U.L.Rev. 461 (1989). The eighth 
problem stated in analysis was the judiciary as emplaced within what the author 
discerned to be for the most part a self-regulating profession.

18 
Blacks Law Dictionary 584 (5th ed. 1979).

19 A 
similar characterization would apply to defendant's contention of inadequate 
pleading of fraud where the defense was characterized by the court to be "an 
attempt to distract the court from seeing the forest by showing it the trees." 
Raymark Industries, Inc., 714 F. Supp.  at 467. The attorney's representation of 
a viable claim when he had manufactured the allegations and proposed supporting 
evidence has similar attributes to the statement that a distraught woman does 
not need independent counsel in selling a large ranch estate or in accepting an 
unconscionable proposal while serving in a fiduciary capacity. In Raymark 
Industries, Inc., 714 F. Supp.  at 467 n. 1, the trial court, in discussing the 
code of professional responsibility, related:

[T]he court is convinced that the entire course of conduct, 
as alleged in plaintiff's complaint, is relevant here. If such lawyers will so 
willingly defy their professional code of conduct, they will hardly be found to 
take care as to the propriety of their product. Thus, such acts put in place the 
basis for a fraud claim. This fraud, as alleged, was not only upon Raymark, but 
upon this court! A full factual inquiry is clearly necessitated.

See 
likewise the evidentiary status of the code of professional responsibility in 
the attorney malpractice negligent misrepresentation case of Miami Intern. 
Realty Co. v. Paynter, 841 F.2d 348 (10th Cir. 1988), where a $2.1 million damage award resulted from a real 
estate transaction. The award against the attorney for malpractice by the trial 
court was affirmed on appeal.

This 
case cannot be compared to litigation derived from effective bilateral 
negotiation where each party was represented by attorneys upon whom they each 
could rely. Green Spring Farms, 401 N.W.2d 816.

20 The 
district court said it well:

Although the contract purports to "protect" Isaac, Jr. by 
giving him the option of running his 500 A.U.M.'s on the ranch, it is obvious to 
me that he is not now, nor will he ever able to be, capable of running anything. 
He is a frail, sickly boy who cannot even walk straight and who appears also 
mentally retarded, all as a result of his many ailments and operations. It is 
difficult, if not impossible, for me to comprehend how anyone with any degree of 
perspicacity could think otherwise. Frankly, it is questionable that Isaac, Jr. 
will live long enough to exercise the option, and even the contract recognizes 
that possibility where it gives the Arambels the right to buy the 500 A.U.M.'s 
if Isaac, Jr. "does not attain the age of 19 years."