Opinion ID: 1058883
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Enforcement of Lien

Text: Because the intermediate court determined that the lien was invalid, it did not address the secondary issue of enforcement. Accordingly, we must determine whether the trial court had authority to execute on the lien and enter a judgment for McCrary. The lien in this case is a charging lien [2] attached to the proceeds generated from the sale of the parties' marital home. While a charging lien serves to secure an attorney's fees, it does not function as an adjudication of the rights between the lawyer and his or her client. Starks, 20 S.W.3d at 652 (citing Pierce v. Lawrence, 84 Tenn. 572, 1 S.W. 204, 205-06 (1886)). Thus, [a] trial court may declare the existence of an attorney's lien in the suit out of which the dispute regarding the attorney's fee arose, but ordinarily an attorney, not being a party to the proceeding, may not obtain a judgment with respect to his or her fee in that action. Id. (citing State v. Edgefield & Kentucky R.R., 63 Tenn. 92, 97 (1874); Perkins v. Perkins, 56 Tenn. (9 Heisk.) 95, 97-98 (1871)). Although an attorney must generally commence a separate proceeding to enforce his or her contractual right to a fee, an exception has been carved out in which the trial court may exert jurisdiction where the money or property that is the subject of the lien comes within the control of the court in the case in which the services were rendered. Id. at 653. In Starks , the Court of Appeals held that the lien did not fall within the narrow confines of the exception because the lien involved a post-judgment dispute between the attorneys and the client over legal fees and expenses. Id. We have here a divorce action in which the trial court adjudicated the distribution of the marital property owned by Schmitt and Smith. The residence that was the subject of McCrary's lien was included in the marital property ultimately divided by the trial court. As such, the property upon which the lien was to be enforced, the house, was within the control of the trial court. Nevertheless, Schmitt cites to Palmer v. Palmer, 562 S.W.2d 833 (Tenn.Ct.App.1977), for the proposition that the exception enunciated in Starks does not apply in divorce actions. However, the facts in this case are distinguishable from those in Palmer . In Palmer , a couple divorced, and the trial court awarded the wife a certain piece of property as part of the divorce settlement. 562 S.W.2d at 835. The trial court also found that the wife's attorneys were entitled to $12,000 in fees and ordered the husband and wife each to pay $6,000. Id. at 836. The court then placed a lien only on the wife's property for her $6,000 share of the attorney's fees. Id. The wife's attorneys were allowed to intervene in the cause, and they argued that the lien on the wife's property should have been for the entire $12,000. The Court of Appeals affirmed the judgment of the trial court, stating that it could not agree that the allowance of a $12,000.00 fee to be paid one half by the wife and one half by the husband thereby compels the trial judge to declare a lien for the entire $12,000.00 against property awarded to the wife. Id. at 839. Thus, Palmer does not support Schmitt's argument. Rather, the court in Palmer addressed the question of whether the wife's attorneys could assert a lien on the wife's property for a fee which the husband had been ordered to pay. Id. at 838. In fact, the Court of Appeals noted that a [t]rial [c]ourt may, to a degree, rule upon the rights of counsel against his client, and that is when counsel seeks the declaration and enforcement of his lien against the funds or property recovered by his efforts. Id. at 839. Therefore, we hold that the trial court properly adjudicated the attorney's lien in this case. However, Schmitt contends that even if the divorce action was originally in the trial court's jurisdiction, there was no action pending in which McCrary could have pursued her petition because McCrary did not file her amended lien until three months after the date of the final judgment. As we have held that McCrary gave proper notice of her attorney's lien by filing it in the Shelby County Register's Office, we conclude that such notice was sufficient to bring the action within the jurisdiction of the divorce court. Further, although the amended lien was filed after the date of the final judgment, McCrary had filed the initial lien well before that date. Moreover, at the time McCrary filed the petition to enforce her lien, the petition to require the sale of the marital residence was pending. Thus, the subject of the lien was still within the jurisdiction of the trial court. Finally, we note that it is in the interest of judicial economy to allow the same court to hear all matters regarding the property in question. Forcing the parties to proceed in a separate action with a judge unfamiliar with the underlying facts of the divorce action would cause both parties to incur additional attorney's fees, costs, and litigation expenses. Therefore, we hold that the trial court in this case had jurisdiction to adjudicate McCrary's attorney's lien.