Court Opinion

ID: 9859143
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 18:50:27.772354+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T10:06:40.061781
License: Public Domain

HARRIS, Justice
(dissenting).
I dissent for the reasons stated in the dissenting opinion in Hulse v. Wifvat, 306 N.W.2d 707, 714-16 (Iowa 1981). I do not think the legislature, in adopting Iowa Code § 232.141(l)(d), intended to make it illegal for the judge to consider a lawyer’s obligation to assist the poor when fixing “[r]ea-sonable compensation.” I recognize no statute and, prior to the majority holdings here and in Hulse, no rule which makes it illegal to give consideration to that long-recognized obligation.
The majority cannot say, and does not say, the fees allowed here were unreasonable. The fees strike me as entirely reasonable and this is all the legislature required them to be.
I would annul the writ.
McGIVERIN, J., joins this dissent.