Robertson v. Robertson

Appeal from an order of the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court in the first judicial department, entered November 19, 1915, which affirmed an order of Special Term granting a motion for a substitution of attorneys for plaintiff in an action for divorce, conditioned upon plaintiff paying the amount found due her attorney upon a reference directed to fix his compensation or her giving an undertaking conditioned for said payment, but refusing to hold that the lien of said attorney should be upon all the papers filed on behalf of the plaintiff in the office of the clerk of the court and those in the possession of the attorney and adjudging that the said attorney have no lien upon any moneys which may become due to the plaintiff herein by virtue of a certain agreement, dated October 6, 1915, between the plaintiff and the defendant, which agreement provided for certain payments to be made to plaintiff by the defendant in lieu of alimony. Plaintiff contended that in an action for divorce the lien of an attorney for services or disbursements does not attach to any alimony allowed by final or interlocutory judgment; that as an attorney has no hen upon alimony granted in an action for divorce, he has no lien upon anything taking its place by a settlement between the parties in regard to alimony and that there can be no hen, in the nature of things, upon a verdict in a divorce action which simply finds upon the question of adultery.