Opinion ID: 2428858
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Same parties or their privies

Text: Crockett & Brown argues the parties before the Ashley Circuit Court are not the same parties named in the Pulaski Chancery Court lawsuit. Crockett & Brown's original motion was brought in a lawsuit between Richard Courson and Randall Averett. Those parties are named in the Pulaski Chancery Court case. As stated above, res judicata bars Crockett & Brown's action in Pulaski County against those parties. Additional defendants are named in the Pulaski Chancery Court suit, Richard Courson's new attorneys and Randall Averett's insurance company. In response to this argument it is contended that these parties are privies to the original parties for purposes of res judicata. We need not address this argument, as the doctrine of collateral estoppel bars the issues presented in Crockett & Brown's lawsuit against the additional parties. Crockett & Brown's lawsuit seeks attorneys' fees pursuant to §§ 16-22-301 to XX-XX-XXX, the same statutes addressed in the first suit and subsequent appeal. That appeal was based on a motion litigated in Ashley Circuit Court. The Ashley Circuit Court entered an order granting Crockett & Brown a reasonable fee pursuant to § 16-22-303. On appeal we held the statutes did not establish a lien in a case in which the attorneys asserting it had been discharged for cause. The holding that Crockett & Brown had been discharged for cause and thus was entitled only to a reasonable fee rather than a contract fee as provided in the statutes was essential to our ruling in that appeal. Crockett & Brown is thus precluded from relitigating the issue of its fee as the doctrine of collateral estoppel does not require that the same parties be involved.