We must say that we’re a touch conflicted about the Hawaii Supreme Court’s 4-1 decision in Lopez v. State of Hawaii, No. SCWC-11-0000512 (Feb. 12, 2014), issued yesterday.
On one hand, we like the idea that the fruits of your labor are your “property,” and cannot be taken away from you by the state without due process, compensation, and the like. Thus, when a lawyer is impressed into service by the state, it is a taking of property to limit her fee to the artificially low number the legislature established in appointed counsel cases. Thus, we have mild dissonance when we say that we think the majority opinion in Lopez got it right when it rejected a lawyer’s claim that his statutory lien on his client’s personal injury judgment was not protected by due process from the effects of a state statute that gives the state’s child support lien super-priority.
Justice Acoba’s empassioned dissenting opinion, argued that the lien is the lawyer’s property, and thus not subject to the statute’s requirements.
Somewhat ironically in this case, it really doesn’t matter, since the
Lopez v. State of Hawaii, No. SCWC-11-0000512 (Haw. Feb. 12, 2014)
Lopez v. State of Hawaii, No. SCWC-11-0000512 (Haw. Feb. 12, 2014) (Acoba, J., dissenting)