Kaushansky v. Stonecroft Attorneys, APC (2025)

Citation: Kaushansky v. Stonecroft Attorneys, APC (2025)
Parent Document: Kaushansky v. Stonecroft Attorneys, APC (2025)
Jurisdiction: California (state)
Effective Date: 2025-03-14
Original Source: https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/10356658/kaushansky-v-stonecroft-attorneys-apc/ ↗

Full Text

1,800 chars

9
require the plaintiff to prove that any judgment she would have
obtained was collectible.
      In Hastings v Halleck (1859) 13 Cal. 203 (Hastings),
decided nine years after California became the 31st state and
which the court in Campbell cited once (Campbell, supra,
184 Cal.App.2d at p. 754), the plaintiff was part owner in a
building, along with a bank and others. The plaintiff went out of
town, but he left two agents “with full power to act for him in
matters pertaining to his interest in the property.” (Hastings,
supra, 13 Cal. at p. 208.) The plaintiff’s agents agreed with the
other owners to make improvements to the property, and the
agents, on behalf of the plaintiff, executed a promissory note in
favor of the bank for the plaintiff’s share. The bank eventually
sued on the note, and the plaintiff hired the attorney defendants
to represent him. After the bank obtained a judgment against
the plaintiff, the plaintiff sued his attorneys for malpractice,
claiming they failed to assert the bank had made an
“unauthorized change in the plans of building,” which was a good
defense to the bank’s action. (Id. at pp. 208-209.) The Supreme
Court affirmed the judgment in favor of the attorneys in the legal
malpractice action, holding “no such defense really existed, or
could have been proven,” in the underlying action because the
plaintiff’s agents approved the change in plans. (Id. at pp. 210-
211.)
      Hastings, like Lally, involved the failure to prove the
merits of the underlying action. The Supreme Court in Hastings
held that, even if the attorney defendants were negligent or
guilty of “unskillful management of a cause in which they were
retained by plaintiff” (Hastings, supra, 13 Cal. at p. 207), the
plaintiff did not prove, and could not have proven, the attorneys’

Other Sections in This Document (56)

Full Text