Fredianelli v. Price (2017)
Decided October5,2017, en banc, Advance Opinion74. The complete signed majority and dissent were retrieved as a fourteen-page PDF from an unofficial host. The caption was corrected from the underlying paternity defendant Martinez to former counsel Fine Carman Price. The official bound-report reader confirms the opinion starts at133Nev586; page589 is an internal pinpoint, not its first page. Complete court PDF, official bound-report reader, printed586.
Facts and complete majority holding
After a final order in a paternity action, former counsel filed and served a retaining-lien notice for$13,701.82 unpaid agreed fees, then moved to adjudicate the lien and enter judgment. The former client disputed the remedy, not the amount or reasonableness. The district court’s judgment was affirmed. Full opinion, majority pp.1–7.
The2013 amendments toNRS18.015 provide an active statutory enforcement method for the historically common-law retaining lien. The majority rejected all three arguments: the remedy is not necessarily passive; no affirmative recovery is needed because the lien attaches possessed files/property, not a recovery; and subsection6 permits reduction to a monetary judgment. Proper written client notice perfected the lien, attachment followed notice, and more than five days’ notice preceded adjudication. The opinion expressly declined to adjudicate uncontested fee amount/reasonableness. Full majority and footnote3.
Treatment within the opinion and dissent
The majority distinguishes Leventhal as applying the pre-amendment statute. It preserves Argentena and earlier cases concerning common-law passive liens, but not as a bar to the new statutory method. It does not say the Legislature originally created the common-law category. Hardesty, joined by Pickering, dissented: after finality a separate fee action should be required; the statute should not permit a summary personal judgment on a file-retention lien. The dissent discusses Morse and Argentena’s limitation of Gordon; those are the dissent’s reasons, not additional majority holdings. Complete majority and dissent.
Current-law boundary
CurrentNRS18.015 retains the lien, notice, five-day adjudication and professional- responsibility provisions compared here. This decision supports a mandatory origin-labeled lien regime innevada, not a private auction of confidential files or automatic cancellation of senior property rights. The full holding and current statute were verified; no exhaustive later-treatment certificate is claimed. Current NRS18.015.
Applies in →
nevada · businesses-and-going-concerns
Legal information, not legal advice. Verify current law, professional duties and the actual enforcement order with a licensed attorney.