Court Opinion

ID: 9724077
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 10:43:37.269088+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:24:55.129746
License: Public Domain

JOHNSON, J., Concurring.
I concur wholeheartedly with the ruling and the rationale of that part of the majority’s decision which reverses the summary judgment as to respondent Worton. I concur separately, however, to register a concern about the limited reading the majority gives to our earlier decision in Robinson v. McGinn (1987) 195 Cal.App.3d 66 [240 Cal.Rptr. 423] in the course of affirming the summary judgment as to respondent Newell.
I concur in the Newell judgment because I agree the harm was “irremediable” in the instant case even though appellant conceivably could file a future motion requesting the trial court to modify its award. In my opinion, the mere possibility the plaintiff might sometime file an independent legal action which might serve to mitigate the damages the defendant’s malpractice caused does not make the plaintiff’s harm “remediable.”
I depart from the majority opinion, however, when it implies the rationale of our Robinson opinion is limited to administrative appeals. True, that case happened to involve a situation where the plaintiff’s harm did not become “irremedial” until he lost an administrative appeal of an administrative body’s initial determination against him. The rationale of that opinion, however, extends to judicial appeals of judicial decisions as well. Indeed most of the decisions cited in Robinson related to trial court judgments and appeals from those judgments.
Under the Robinson rationale a trial court judgment which is adverse to a client because of his attorney’s alleged malpractice does not cause “irremedial” harm until any appeal filed in that case likewise has been decided against the client. In Robinson we relied in part on Bowman v. Abramson (E.D.Pa. 1982) 545 F.Supp. 227 which affirmed the dismissal of a legal malpractice case because the two medical malpractice cases allegedly lost because of the lawyer’s malpractice were still pending on appeal. “ ‘Until the underlying medical malpractice cases are decided adversely to the plaintiff [by the appellate court] the case against his former attorneys is hypothetical *1654and his damages are speculative.’ ” (Robinson v. McGinn, supra, 195 Cal.App.3d 66, 76, quoting Bowman v. Abramson, supra, 545 F.Supp. 227, 228.) Since the damages remain “speculative” while the underlying action is on appeal, they are neither “irremediable” nor “actual and appreciable.”1 Accordingly, the cause of action is not complete and the statute of limitations on the legal malpractice action does not commence running. (Alternatively, this could be viewed as an application of California’s “equitable tolling doctrine.” (Elkins v. Derby (1974) 12 Cal.3d 410 [115 Cal.Rptr. 641, 525 P.2d 81, 71 A.L.R.3d 839]; 3 Witkin, Cal. Procedure (3d ed. 1985) §§ 510-514.) This doctrine tolls the statute of limitations as to one form of relief (the legal malpractice action) while a litigant actively pursues relief in another action (an appeal to determine the lawyer’s acts were not prejudicial malpractice).
As we pointed out in Robinson, to require clients to file legal malpractice actions against their lawyers while appeals are still pending in the underlying action “would further burden our existing overly crowded court calendars with the filing of potentially meritless lawsuits by plaintiffs waiting to learn whether they indeed will be suffering irremediable harm.” (Robinson v. McGinn, supra, 195 Cal.App.3d at p. 77.)
To the extent the majority opinion can be read to start the statute of limitations running in legal malpractice actions while the underlying cases are still on appeal I am compelled to dissent from its reasoning. I have reservations both about the logic and the policy of such a rule. We were on the right track in Robinson and should stay there.
Respondents’ petition for review by the Supreme Court was denied January 29, 1992.

It is possible a client may have an action in small claims court or municipal court for some attorney fees required to mitigate or cure the effects of the lawyer’s malpractice. This cause of action may exist irrespective of the outcome of the appeal in the underlying action. Yet this possibility should not start the statute running on the malpractice action itself which requires proof the client was denied a “collectible judgment.” (Campbell v. Magana (1960) 184 Cal.App.2d 751, 754, 761 [8 Cal.Rptr. 32].) If the client prevails on appeal in the underlying case he will not have been denied a “collectible judgment” and his cause of action will fail. So until that appeal is resolved the client has not suffered the sort of “actual and appreciable” (or “irremediable”) harm required to complete a legal malpractice cause of action.