Opinion ID: 2295872
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 9

Heading: Continuing Representation Doctrine

Text: The plaintiffs additionally argue that § 9-1-13(a) and § 9-1-14.3 were tolled under the continuing representation doctrine. The plaintiffs allege that Factor, as executor of the estate, and K & K, as attorneys for the executor, had an ongoing fiduciary duty with and to [plaintiffs] at least until the time Factor presented the Second and Third and Final Accountings to the Probate Court in September 2008. They further contend that the executor/beneficiary relationship is analogous to an attorney/client relationship. To support their argument, plaintiffs cite to Feddersen v. Garvey, 427 F.3d 108 (1st Cir.2005), an appeal to the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit in a New Hampshire case, in which, according to plaintiffs, the First Circuit applied the continuing representation doctrine to an attorney-client relationship. The First Circuit, in Feddersen, stated that [i]n jurisdictions where [the continuing representation doctrine] applies, that doctrine, which `recognizes that a person seeking professional assistance has a right to repose confidence in the professional's ability and good faith,'    `tolls the statute of limitations while the defendant attorney [in a malpractice case] continues to represent the plaintiff.' Feddersen, 427 F.3d at 114 (quoting Greene v. Greene, 56 N.Y.2d 86, 451 N.Y.S.2d 46, 436 N.E.2d 496, 500 (1982) and Rosen Construction Ventures, Inc. v. Mintz, Levin, Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky and Popeo, P.C., 364 F.3d 399, 406 (1st Cir.2004)). The First Circuit, however, held that the plaintiff's continuing representation argument fail[ed] because New Hampshire has not adopted the doctrine. Id. Even if we were to adopt this doctrine in this case, it would not apply because defendants' allegedly actionable conduct occurred more than twenty years before plaintiffs filed suit and was well known to plaintiffs at the time. 3