Baker v. Huff

These consolidated appeals arise from assorted litigation spawned by a single-car accident in December 2002 in which Harlan Huff was killed when he lost control of his car and hit a tree, and his adult son, Joshua Huff Joshua, a passenger in the car, was seriously injured. Liberty Mutual Insurance Company provided a liability insurance policy on the car with policy limits of $100,000 per person. In pursuit of a personal injury claim against the Estate of Harlan Huff Harlan’s Estate, Joshua made time-limited offers to Liberty Mutual to settle the claim for the policy limits. Liberty Mutual eventually tendered the policy limits, but not within the time deadline, and Joshua rejected the tender. Joshua’s personal injury suit was tried in January 2006 resulting in a $278,806 judgment against Harlan’s Estate. Liberty Mutual paid the $100,000 policy limits to partially satisfy the judgment, leaving an unpaid judgment against Harlan’s Estate in excess of the policy limits in the amount of $178,806, and leaving Harlan’s Estate with a potential claim against Liberty Mutual for the unpaid judgment based on allegations that Liberty Mutual acted in bad faith or negligently by failing to accept the time-limited offers to settle Joshua’s claim for the policy limits.

Patricia Huff,1 the executrix of Harlan’s Estate, refused Joshua’s request for assignment of the Estate’s claim against Liberty Mutual. As executrix, Patricia Huff hired an attorney, Bonnie Baker of the law firm of Meadows & Macie, P.C. where Patricia worked as a paralegal to represent Harlan’s Estate. Baker negotiated with Liberty Mutual to attempt to settle the Estate’s claim, but Huff, as executrix, refused to sign a draft agreement purporting to settle the claim for $15,000. Liberty Mutual unsuccessfully sued to enforce the settlement, ultimately resulting in this Court’s decision in In re Estate of Huff, 287 Ga. App. 614 652 SE2d 203 2007, ruling that there was no settlement agreement. In the meantime, Patricia Huff, as executrix, eventually offered to assign the Estate’s claim against Liberty Mutual to Joshua, but Joshua refused the offer and filed a motion in the probate court seeking removal of Huff as executrix of Harlan’s Estate. In April 2007, the probate court granted the motion; removed Patricia Huff as executrix of Harlan’s Estate; and appointed Joshua as administrator with the will annexed of Harlan’s Estate.