GEORGE ABRAHAM, APPELLANT,
v.
SHERRIE LLEO ABRAHAM, APPELLEE
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Husband's appeal of temporary attorney's fees award is treated as a motion to enforce the court's prior mandate, which required restitution of fees paid to the wife's law firm for services rendered in a domestic violence proceeding predating the dissolution action.
A settlement agreement that preserves parties' rights to seek return of fees paid to counsel does not insulate the law firm from restitution obligations when the appellate mandate reversed the award of those fees.
[1] A settlement agreement that preserves parties' rights to seek return of fees paid to counsel does not prevent enforcement of an appellate mandate requiring restitution of…
Previewing 1 of 1 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“the settlement 'shall [not] prevent either party from seeking a return of fees and costs paid to the Abrams Law Firm or from contending any claims from said law firm.'”
The parties' settlement agreement explicitly preserved their right to seek return of fees paid to the law firm.
The parties settled their dissolution case with an exception preserving their right to seek return of fees paid to the Abrams Law Firm. The trial cour…
The full statement of facts, procedural history, and disposition for this case are member content.
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Order Enforcing Mandate
PER CURIAM.
The husband appeals from an award of temporary and prospective attorney’s fees. We treat his appeal as a motion to enforce our mandate from a previous appearance of the case in Abraham v. Abraham, 700 So. 2d 421 (Fla. 3d DCA 1997). On the going down of the mandate, the parties reached a complete settlement agreement with one exception. There they agreed that their settlement “shall [not] prevent either party from seeking a return of fees and costs paid to the Abrams Law Firm or from contending any claims from said law firm.” In that decision, we had reversed various temporary relief including “attorney’s fees to the wife for services rendered by her lawyers (Abrams) in a domestic violence proceeding which was filed and litigated before the rendition of dissolution of marriage-” The trial judge denied the husband’s motion for restitution of the latter fees, we think ' erroneously. While the settlement mooted out all other possible claims, it did not insulate the wife’s attorneys to whom those fees were paid directly by the husband. While there is contrary authority for requiring restitution, the law of the case compels that we grant in part the husband’s motion to enforce the mandate in accordance with our decision.1
SCHWARTZ, C.J., and NESBITT, J., concur. . The law firm will then be in a position to seek payment for legal services provided to the wife prior to the commencement of the dissolution proceeding.
COPE, J.
(dissenting).
I would affirm on authority of Wall v. Johnson, 80 So. 2d 362 (Fla.1955); and Martin v. Lenahan, 658 So. 2d 119 (Fla. 4th DCA 1995)(citing Restatement of Restitution § 74, comment h & illus. 20 (1937)).
Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus
Citator
Cited By
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Wright v. Lewis, 870 So. 2d 179 (Fla. 4th DCA 2004)…order compliance with its mandates and to issue a judgment which the trial court should have issued pursuant to the mandate. Posner v. Posner, 257 So. 2d 530 (Fla.1972). This is an appropriate situation for enforcing our mandate. Abraham v. Abraham, 730 So. 2d 746 (Fla. 3d DCA 1999). We grant the motion. The father moved for relief under Florida Rule of Civil Procedure 1.540(b), which authorizes the trial court to relieve a party from a void order or judgment. The trial court determined that, because the fat…1 / 2
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A.M. Hochstadt v. Sanctuary Homeowners Ass'n, Inc., 882 So. 2d 1094 (Fla. 4th DCA 2004)…ed to GE all his rights to the property. Thus, any claim to recover based upon the foreclosure of the first mortgage originally held by AmeriFirst has been waived, and the trial court correctly refused to enforce the mandate. See Abraham v. Abraham, 730 So. 2d 746, 747 (Fla. 3d DCA 1999) (refusing to enforce provisions of mandate when parties reached settlement agreement on those provisions after the court’s issuance of the mandate). Furthermore, while Hochstadt seeks to obtain a judgment against Sanctuary fo…
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Sherrie Lleo Abraham v. Abraham, 775 So. 2d 937 (Fla. 2000)…PER CURIAM. We initially accepted review of the decision in Abraham v. Abraham, 730 So. 2d 746 (Fla. 3d DCA 1999), based on alleged express and direct conflict under article V, section 3(b)(3) of the Florida Constitution. Upon further consideration, we find that jurisdiction was improvidently granted. Accordingly, we hereby dismiss review of…1 / 2
Authorities Cited
- Wall v. Peggie Johnson, 80 So. 2d 362 (Fla. 1955)
- Douglas Martin, M.D. v. Lenahan, 658 So. 2d 119 (Fla. 4th DCA 1995)
- Barth Satuloff v. Am. Reliance Ins. Co., 700 So. 2d 421 (Fla. 3d DCA 1997)
- Abraham v. Sherrie Lleo Abraham, 700 So. 2d 421 (Fla. 3d DCA 1997)