Texas High Court OKs Attorney/Client Arbitration Clause
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The ethics of lawyers signing up clients with contracts that make sure fee disputes never reach a jury is certainly debatable, but such arbitration clauses are not “unconscionable,” according to a recent ruling by the Texas Supreme Court.
The decision reverses and remands a decision by Corpus Christi’s 13th Court of Appeals denying a motion to compel arbitration sought by the firm Royston, Rayzor, Vickery & Williams. The intermediate appellate court found it “unconscionable” to sign up a client that sent all disputes between the parties to arbitration—except fee disputes—because it favored the law firm. [See ” Is a Firm/Client Arbitration Clause Unconscionable?,” Texas Lawyer, March 2, 2015.]
The background to Royston, Rayzor, Vickery & Williams v. Lopez is as follows. Frank Lopez retained Royston to represent him in a claim against his common law wife after she won $11 million playing the lottery. Lopez signed an employment contract with the firm that gave Royston a 20 percent contingency fee and contained an arbitration provision to settle any disputes he had with the firm—but it did not apply to any claims the Royston firm had to recover its fees.
Read more: www.texaslawyer.com/id=1202730860711/High-Court-OKs-AttorneyClient-Arbitration-Clause#ixzz3eYM4o31Z
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