O'Kain v. Landress

“In the absence of an express agreement, a putative client’s subjective belief that there is a lawyer-client relationship must be accompanied by objective facts that make that belief reasonable.” Lahn v. Vaisbort, 276 Or App 468, 477, 369 P3d 85 (2016)

Plaintiffs appealed a judgment of the trial court which dismissed with prejudice their legal malpractice claim against Defendants. Plaintiffs assigned error to the trial court’s decision to grant Defendants' motion for summary judgment, as well as the trial court’s denial of Plaintiffs’ motion for partial summary judgment, which was related to the issue of whether Defendants' represented the individual Plaintiffs as well as their company. On appeal, Plaintiffs argued that the evidence in the record showed that Plaintiffs’ were Defendants' clients as a matter of law. In response, Defendants argued that the only lawyer-client relationship that was formed was by the Defendants' retainer agreement with Plaintiffs’ LLCs and that there is no evidence on the record that Defendant gave legal advice to the individual Plaintiffs. “In the absence of an express agreement, a putative client’s subjective belief that there is a lawyer-client relationship must be accompanied by objective facts that make that belief reasonable.” Lahn v. Vaisbort, 276 Or App 468, 477, 369 P3d 85 (2016). The Court held that the record reflects a genuine issue of material fact of whether Plaintiffs’ subjective belief that Defendants’ were representing them personally. Therefore, both the Defendants and the Plaintiffs are precluded from receiving a grant of summary judgment.

Reversed and remanded.