Chodos

INTRODUCTION

An attorney, who represented a client in two divorce cases and a related Marvin action without a statutorily required written hourly or contingency fee agreement, sued his client for the reasonable value of the services he rendered in the three cases. The jury, using a multiplier of five to increase the attorney’s hourly rate to $5,000 per hour, awarded the attorney $7.5 million in attorney fees for work on two of the cases (plus $300,000 or $1,000 per hour for work on the first action). That amount greatly exceeded the amount that would have been due under an alleged oral hourly rate agreement and the amount to which the attorney would have been entitled under a contingency fee agreement the parties discussed towards the end of the representation, but to which the parties did not agree. On appeal, the client contends, inter alia, that the trial court erred when its instructions allowed the jury to use the lodestar adjustment method, including an enhancement or multiplier, in calculating a reasonable fee in the attorney’s quantum meruit action.

We hold that under the circumstances of this case, there was no legal or equitable justification for applying a…