Opinion ID: 199309
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The parties' expectations at the time of the fee application.

Text: 37 Finally, we examine whether treating these two claims as a single trial unit would conform to the parties' expectations. In assessing the parties' litigation expectations, we look to the parties' knowledge at the time of the first suit on the underlying facts. SeePorn, 93 F.3d at 37. The Iannochinos contend that at the time of the fee application they did not know that Rodolakis and Aframe might have violated their duty of care towards them. As laypersons, they say, they would have little idea about the standards governing the legal profession, and thus they had no way of knowing whether the defendants had breached those standards. Without this knowledge of a breach of duty, the Iannochinos contend, they could not have known that they had a malpractice claim against the defendants. We disagree. When evaluating the parties' expectations, we are guided by the principle that, where two claims arose in the same time frame out of similar facts, one would reasonably expect them to be brought together. Id. Therefore, rather than considering whether the Iannochinos knew of the precise legal contours of their malpractice claim at the time of the fee application, we must instead determine whether they knew of the factual basis of that claim. 38 The Iannochinos point to three areas in which they claim Rodolakis gave them substandard advice: his advice to repudiate the Kwik Kopy franchise agreement, to ignore the Clark University lawsuit, and to enter into the bankruptcy. Although the Iannochinos may not have had any reason to question this advice when given, their situation at the time of the fee application necessarily changed the reasonable perception of these events. By that time, their relationship with their attorney had broken down. Indeed, Rodolakis withdrew from the case because there [was] no effective attorney/client relationship between counsel and the Debtors. In each instance, the advice the Iannochinos now claim was improper resulted in almost immediate negative results. After the Iannochinos removed all Kwik Kopy indicia from the Iannochinos' print store and opened under another name, Kwik Kopy took aggressive actions to enforce its rights under the franchise agreement, including requesting relief on multiple occasions from the automatic stay so that it might enforce the non-compete provision of the contract. Likewise, their inaction on the Clark University lawsuit quickly resulted in a default judgment. Indeed, the record indicates that the Iannochinos were upset about the Clark lawsuit and felt that they should not ignore what they thought were their valid counterclaims to that action. Furthermore, by the time of the fee application, the bankruptcy had been converted from Chapter 13 to Chapter 7. This conversion surely brought with it a similar reevaluation of whether it had been appropriate to file for bankruptcy in the first instance. Accordingly, the Iannochinos knew all the facts necessary for bringing their malpractice claim at the time of the fee application, and we think it reasonable for Aframe and Rodolakis to expect that all concerns about the quality of their services would have been raised in response to the fee application. See Porn, 93 F.3d at 37 (Defendants may reasonably demand that disposition of the first suit establish repose as to all matters that ordinary people would intuitively count part of a single basic dispute.) (quoting 18 Charles A. Wright & Arthur R. Miller, Federal Practice and Procedure §a4407 at 56 (1981)). 39 We are mindful that the Iannochinos were unrepresented at the time of the fee award. The Iannochinos emphasize this fact, arguing that this distinguishes them from the debtor in Intelogic Trace. Although the debtor in that case was represented at the time of the accounting firm's fee application, that fact is not determinative. Indeed, the breakdown of the attorney/client relationship here is further evidence that the Iannochinos should have raised their malpractice claims as objections to the fee award. We reject the suggestion implicit in their argument that parties can ignore facts indicating that they should assert a malpractice claim solely because of a lack of representation.