Opinion ID: 1841248
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: the fund doctrine

Text: The fund doctrine originated as a common law theory of equity allowing an attorney to recover fees from one not his client in very limited situations. In 1893 this court recognized this exception to the general rule that a lawyer cannot recover a fee from one who has neither employed him nor authorized another to do so. See, McGraw v. Andrus, 45 La.Ann. 1073, 13 So. 630 (1893). Only once since then, in In re Interstate Trust & Banking Company, 235 La. 825, 106 So.2d 276 (1958), have we permitted recovery under this doctrine, and the prerequisites for such recovery were made explicit: An attorney may recover fees from those not his clients when that attorney alone and at his own expense has maintained a successful suit for the preservation, protection, or increase of a common fund, or of common property or who has created at his own expense, or brought into court, a fund in which others may share with him. The petition now before us fails to state a cause of action under the fund doctrine on two counts: First, there is absolutely no allegation that the attorneys acted on their own or at their own expense. In fact, the contrary is implied in their admission that their actions were pursuant to a contractual obligation with other heirs. Second, the judicial recognition of the invalidity of a will does not preserve, protect, increase or create a common fund. The estate of Ms. Dubuisson existed and the heirs were seized as of the moment of her death whether the will purporting to dispose of that estate were valid or not. The efforts of these attorneys to have the will declared invalid did not increase or create an estate, but merely enlarged the class of heirs entitled to participate in the succession. See also, Succession of Kernan, supra.