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Alston Bird LLP v. Hatcher Management Holdings LLC

The trial court erred in striking the defendant law firm's apportionment notice in a suit for legal malpractice and breach of fiduciary duty.

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Hatcher Management Holdings, LLC, the Company filed suit against Alston Bird LLP the Firm, asserting legal malpractice and breach of fiduciary duty claims. The Firm filed a notice of nonparty fault pursuant to OCGA § 51-12-33, seeking to apportion damages among the Company and multiple nonparties. The trial court granted the Company’s motion to strike the notice and certified the issue for immediate review. This Court granted the Firm’s application for interlocutory appeal, and for the reasons that follow, we reverse the trial court’s order striking the Firm’s apportionment notice.

In 2000, Maury Hatcher employed the Firm and one of its trust and real estate partners, John Sawyer, to create the Company, which was established to hold the assets, including real estate, of the Hatcher family patriarch as an estate planning mechanism.1 Maury was the manager of the Company, which was comprised of various Hatcher family members, including Maury and several of his siblings. According to the Company, Maury secretly liquidated and redeemed his interest in the Company, personally valuing his interest, which constituted a breach of his fiduciary duty, and he embezzled a large portion of the Company’s assets. In January 2009, Maury resigned from the Company, but Sawyer and the Firm continued to act at his direction, despite their continued representation of the Company; the Firm did not disclose the conflict of interest to the Company, nor did it inform the Company of Maury’s actions.

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