Deborah Sieg Bowen, et al. v. John Tatum and Hunter, Maclean, Exley & Dunn

Legal Malpractice - Negligence - Conspiracy - Fraud - Conversion - Mrs. Robert Sieg, Sr. and Deborah Sieg Bowen sued attorney
John Tatum and the law firm of Hunter, Maclean, Exley & Dunn,
alleging that Tatum committed professional malpractice, breach of
fiduciary duty, negligence, conspiracy, fraud, and conversion.
The plaintiffs, mother and sister of the late Robert Sieg, Jr.,
based their claims on assertions that Tatum should have given them
a copy of Sieg's prenuptial agreement, which allegedly barred his
widow from inheriting, and would have informed them they were
entitled to Sieg's entire estate.

The trial court granted summary judgment to the defendants on
plaintiffs' legal malpractice and breach of fiduciary duty claims,
because the plaintiffs were never the defendants' clients. The
trial court also found that under Georgia law the defendants owed
no fiduciary duty to the plaintiffs. The trial court then
bifurcated the trial of the remaining issues.

In February 1990, CPA Robert Sieg, Jr. fell down a set of
stairs in his house and died. He had no children and no will.
His widow, Lynne Sieg, hired attorney Tatum to help her administer
the estate. The probate court appointed her the estate
administrator, and she was discharged from those duties in
December 1990.

Although Sieg's mother and sister were aware of the existence
of a prenuptial agreement before the administration was closed,
they waited until May 1991, five months after the discharge, to
ask attorney Tatum if Sieg had entered into a prenuptial contract
with Lynne Sieg. Tatum responded by letter that he was aware of
such a contract (he did not draft it), but could not deliver a
copy to them without his client's permission, which Lynne Sieg
declined to give. In August 1994, three years after receiving
Tatum's letter, the decedent's sister and mother sued Lynne Sieg,
asserting she had waived her rights as an heir at law in a
prenuptial agreement. The widow responded in defense that the
mother and sister had no standing to enforce the prenuptial.

Defendant's verdict.

Unknown

Unknown

Affirmed by the Court of Appeals of Georgia. See: ___ Ga. App. ___ (1999), ___ S.E.2d ___. Note: The above date reflects the appellate court decision date, not the original trial date. Reported by kkm.