IN RE ESTATE OF KATHRYN RAYHILL. LAWRENCE E. MAXWELL, AS PERSONAL REPRESENTATIVE OF THE ESTATE OF KATHRYN B. RAYHILL, DECEASED, APPELLANT,
v.
BURNETT ROTH, APPELLEE
AI-generated. These summaries, headnotes, and key points are machine-generated and may contain errors or omissions. Always verify against the full opinion text below. Not legal advice.
On remand from a prior appeal that had overturned a $70,000 attorney's fee award, the trial court awarded Burnett Roth $80,000 in fees for services to the Estate of Kathryn B. Rayhill. The appellate court reversed, finding that Roth lacked adequate time records, had included hours unrelated to estate services, and that the appropriate fee should not exceed $33,300.
Roth is entitled to no more than $33,300 in attorney's fees, calculated at $225 per hour for approximately 148 hours of properly identifiable legal services benefiting the estate, after excluding 90 hours spent obtaining fees and 50 unrelated hours.
[1] An attorney is not entitled to fees for services rendered in an effort to obtain fees from an estate.
[2] An attorney is not entitled to fees for services unconnected to any identified legal service performed for the benefit of an estate.
Previewing 2 of 5 headnotes on this case. FLexlaw’s editorially structured points of law — every proposition, pinpointed — are reserved for members.
Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence“Roth, although entitled to fees for services which benefited the estate, was not entitled to fees for his representation of the personal representative who had been found to have procured the execution of the will by undue influence.”
Establishes that Roth could recover fees only for services benefiting the estate and innocent parties, not for representing the party found guilty of undue influence.
Previewing 1 of 3 key quotes on this case — the court’s exact language, pinpointed for members.
Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligenceBurnett Roth represented interests in the Estate of Kathryn B. Rayhill. The estate's personal representative had been found guilty of procuring the wi…
The full statement of facts, procedural history, and disposition for this case are member content.
Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence© FLexlaw, Inc. — AI-generated enrichments are proprietary. All rights reserved.
PER CURIAM.
This appeal is from a trial court order awarding to Burnett Roth the sum of $80,-000 as attorney’s fees for services rendered to the Estate of Kathryn B. Rayhill, deceased. The order was entered after an evidentiary hearing held pursuant to our remand in In re Estate of Rayhill, 489 So. 2d 87 (Fla. 3d DCA 1986), in which we overturned a $70,000 fee award to Roth and instructed that Roth, although entitled to fees for services which benefited the estate, was not entitled to fees for his representation of the personal representative who had been found to have procured the execution of the will by undue influence.
Thus, our mandate to the trial court allowed Roth the opportunity to show “specifically identifiable legal services to the bank [the innocent co-personal representative of the estate] which were of benefit to the estate.” Id. at 88.
The record of the evidentiary hearing reflects that Roth had kept no accurate time records, but was able to reconstruct that he had spent 288 hours on the matter and guess that he had spent much more. It is clear, however, that 90 of those hours were expended in efforts to obtain his fees from the estate and 50 were unconnected to any identified legal service, much less a legal service performed for and of benefit to the estate.
Thus, even giving to Roth a generous view of his reconstructed accounting of the remaining 148 hours, and indulging the trial court’s finding that Roth’s reconstructed time excluded services rendered to the undue influencer, we nonetheless conclude that Roth’s fee — calculated at $225.00 per hour, the highest rate reflected in the expert testimony adduced — can be no more than $33,300.
Accordingly, the order under review is reversed with directions that upon remand the amount of the fee fixed in the order be reduced to $33,300.
Reversed and remanded with directions.
Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus
Citator
Authorities Cited
- In re Est. OF Kathryn Rayhill. Lawrence Maxwell v. Burnett Roth, 489 So. 2d 87 (Fla. 3d DCA 1986)