Court Opinion

ID: 9714397
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 05:36:35.133083+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:23:25.752507
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE HARRISON, also dissenting: I respectfully dissent. It is firmly established in Illinois that an attorney who is employed to represent his client in litigation has no authority to compromise, to consent to a judgment against his client, or to give up or to waive any right of his client in the absence of the express consent or authorization of that client. (County of Cook v. Patka (1980), 85 Ill. App. 3d 5, 11.) That is to say, an attorney who is authorized to represent a client in litigation does not necessarily possess the authority to conclude a settlement but must receive express consent or authorization to do so (McAllister v. Hayes (1988), 165 Ill. App. 3d 426, 427-28). (Kazale v. Kar-Lee Flowers (1989), 185 Ill. App. 3d 224, 227; Knisley v. City of Jacksonville (1986), 147 Ill. App. 3d 116, 120.) Indeed, over a century ago this court recognized as “undoubtedly the law” that the authority to prosecute a suit does not involve authority to compromise it and that before doing so an attorney must have special authority for that purpose. Wetherbee v. Fitch (1886), 117 Ill. 67, 75. The dispositive question in this action to declare void and unenforceable the order of the Illinois Industrial Commission approving the settlement of the parties is whether plaintiff’s counsel had the authority necessary to settle plaintiff’s workers’ compensation claim in full. The record shows that the answer to this question remains very much in dispute. The plaintiff alleges in his second amended complaint that his attorney did not advise him, at the time in question, that counsel had entered into a full and final settlement of plaintiff’s claim; that after the settlement had been approved by the Illinois Industrial Commission in December 1984, plaintiff’s attorney represented to him that counsel was still pursuing plaintiff’s workers’ compensation claim; that plaintiff did not agree to a settlement in full of $20,000; and that he did not authorize his attorney, who affixed plaintiff’s signature to the settlement contract without plaintiff’s knowledge, to enter into such a settlement. In his discovery deposition plaintiff testified consistently with these allegations, stating, among other things, that counsel had told him not only that he was negotiating with defendant’s attorneys “for back pay and back pay only” but also that the check plaintiff received was for “back pay.” Plaintiff said that counsel had told him in December of 1984 that thereafter plaintiff would receive, in addition to the partial settlement of $20,000, two-thirds of his pay “for life” and that if plaintiff should die, his widow would receive that amount. Plaintiff indicated further that counsel had first advised him in April of 1986 that his workers’ compensation case had been settled in full. Concerning the question of counsel’s authority to settle in full plaintiff’s workers’ compensation claim, the record includes as well the sworn statement of plaintiff’s counsel, at the disciplinary hearing, indicating that plaintiff had, in fact, accepted the defendant’s offer of $20,000 as full and final settlement, that plaintiff had asked counsel to sign the settlement contract for him because plaintiff was too ill to come to counsel’s office to do so, and that, by inference, counsel had had the authority necessary to settle plaintiff’s claim. In effect, the majority has chosen to believe the version of events testified to by plaintiff’s counsel, according him credence because, in large part, of plaintiff’s knowledge of the conclusion of both his treating physician and defendant’s expert that his condition was not work related but was, instead, caused by smoking. The majority has thereby resolved in favor of the defendant the crucial factual dispute existent in this record. Such a determination, while appropriate for the trier of fact, is inappropriate upon a motion for summary judgment. In my view the existence here of a genuine issue of material fact (Ill. Rev. Stat. 1989, ch. 110, par. 2 — 1005(c)) precludes the entry of summary judgment in favor of either of these parties. For the foregoing reasons I would reverse the judgments of the circuit and appellate courts granting the plaintiff’s motion for summary judgment, affirm the judgments of the circuit and appellate courts denying defendant’s motion for summary judgment, and remand the cause to the circuit court for further proceedings.