Solicitor is holding onto my funds

blass

A friend is in this situation:

"My solicitor is holding onto funds that were awarded to me in a judicial separation. The court ruling found that my ex spouse is liable to pay the legal fees that were incurred during the whole separation hearing - but my solicitor is saying that they cannot obtain these fees from my ex and he has no assets in his name so they will be using the funds awarded to me as payment. Is this right? Can they go against a court ruling and make me pay for my ex's costs?"

Can anyone shed any light on the legality of this behaviour?

Reloc8

The Solicitor is not 'going against a court order'. Your eh friend got the benefit of a court order directing another person to pay his/her legal costs.

This does not mean your friend is not liable to pay legal costs to his or her own legal team. It merely gives them the possibility of recovering those costs from the other person. The Solicitor here is entitled to be paid their own fees by their client although there is a common misapprehension that the fact that the other party is broke means that the solicitor cannot recover against their own client.

Your friend remains liable to his or her solicitor to pay his or her fees and monies held by the solicitor as described by you can lawfully be applied against those fees based on the existence of what is known as a solicitor's lien, in the absence of any impropriety on how the solicitor-client relationship commenced and how the client was advised of their liability to pay fees.

blass

OK thanks for that.

mikofo

solicitor says possession is 9/10ths of law..:)