DEE D. DRELL, District Judge.
For the reasons detailed in a separate ruling issued on this date, the Intervenor Defendants' Rule 12(b)(6) Motion to Dismiss Intervenor's Tortious Interference with Contract Claims (Doc. 158) will be GRANTED. Accordingly, the magistrate judge's Report and Recommendation on Motion to Dismiss (Doc. 383) will be ADOPTED IN PART. However, the Court does NOT ADOPT the portion of the magistrate judge's Report and Recommendation on Motion to Dismiss referring to "policy considerations." (Doc. 383, p. 7).
A number of matters are currently pending before the Court in the captioned lawsuit. Among them is a Rule 12(b)(6) Motion to Dismiss Intervener's Tortious Interference with Contract Claims (Doc. 158) filed by the Intervenor Defendants, the City of Alexandria ("City"), Mayor Jacques Roy ("Mayor Roy"), and City Attorney Charles E. Johnson ("Mr. Johnson") (collectively, "City"), against the Intervenor Plaintiff, Ms. Bridgett Brown ("Ms. Brown"). The magistrate judge issued
The history of this lawsuit is well documented in the annals of this Court and this community. As a brief summary, in the principal action the City alleged that the Defendants, Cleco Corp. et al. (collectively, "Cleco"), the City's electrical utilities provider, caused the City and its ratepayers substantial economic losses through a series of intentional and negligent acts of mismanagement. After more than four long years of litigation, the parties resolved the main demand. By a judgment of dismissal dated February 24, 2010 (Doc. 379), the Court dismissed the City's claims against Cleco with prejudice. The claims in the intervention, however, require us to recount events dating back to the beginning of the litigation.
On July 19, 2005, shortly after the original lawsuit was filed, at the request of the City administration, the Alexandria City Council ("City Council") adopted ordinance No. 214-1005 (Doc. 77-1, Exh. 3) ("Ordinance"). The Ordinance authorized then-Mayor Edward G. Randolph ("Mayor Randolph") to "enter into a Professional Services Agreement with ... Bridgett Brown," a licensed attorney practicing in Alexandria, Louisiana. (Doc. 77-1, Exh. 3, p. 1). Subsequently, Ms. Brown entered into a "Contract for Legal Services and Contingent Fee Agreement" ("Contract") with the City. (Doc. 77-1, Exh. 1). The Contract was executed by Ms. Brown and Mayor Randolph, but was not dated. Under the Contract, Ms. Brown was retained "to represent [the City] in all claims related to any and all transactions and/or any and all other relationships [the City] has or had with Cleco." (Doc. 77-1, Exh. 1, p. 1).
In November 2006, Jacques Roy ("Mayor Roy") was elected Mayor of Alexandria. Mayor Roy appointed attorney Charles E. Johnson, Jr. ("Mr. Johnson") as City Attorney, and Mr. Johnson assumed responsibilities as City Attorney in January 2007. Approximately one month later, in February 2007, Mr. Johnson issued a letter to Ms. Brown purporting to terminate her representation of the City under Section 4-02 of the City's Home Rule Charter. (Doc. 77-1, Exh. 2). In the termination letter, Mr. Johnson opined that Ms. Brown's client was "the City of Alexandria... not just the Council," and that Ms. Brown's "actions have created an incurable conflict of interest with the elected chief administrator of this City." (Doc. 77-1, Exh. 2, p. 2). Finally, Mr. Johnson requested a "detailed itemization" of Ms. Brown's work on the case. (Doc. 77-1, Exh. 2, p. 2).
Instead of complying with Mr. Johnson's requests, Ms. Brown filed a Petition for Intervention (Doc. 77) in the principal litigation on April 17, 2007. Nearly two years after filing her initial "petition," or complaint, Ms. Brown filed a supplemental complaint, adding allegations that Mayor Roy and Mr. Johnson breached their fiduciary duties to the City, and tortiously interfered with her contract with the City, making them jointly or solidarily liable with the City for any damages that she may have incurred. (Doc. 152).
Also during the course of the litigation of the main demand, the City filed two motions against Ms. Brown's claims. The first motion, and the only one that we consider in this ruling, was a motion to
Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6) authorizes a court to dismiss an action for "failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted." In evaluating a Rule 12(b)(6) motion, the Court must accept as true the well-pleaded facts in the plaintiff's complaint, and must construe the facts in a light most favorable to the plaintiff. Arias-Benn v. State Farm Fire & Cas. Ins. Co., 495 F.3d 228, 230 (5th Cir.2007). However, the Court need not "`accept as true conclusory allegations, unwarranted factual inferences, or legal conclusions.'" Id. (quoting Plotkin v. IP Axess Inc., 407 F.3d 690, 696 (5th Cir.2005)).
To survive a Rule 12(b)(6) motion, the plaintiff's "[f]actual allegations must be enough to raise a right to relief above the speculative level, on the assumption that all the allegations in the complaint are true (even if doubtful in fact)." Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 555, 127 S.Ct. 1955, 167 L.Ed.2d 929 (2007). Finally, we note that "[m]otions to dismiss are viewed with disfavor and are rarely granted." Test Masters Educ. Servs., Inc. v. Singh, 428 F.3d 559, 570 (5th Cir.2005).
This motion to dismiss presents the question of whether the cause of action for tortious interference with contract in Louisiana should or can be extended beyond the narrow factual confines of the case in which it was recognized. Ms. Brown maintains that the cause of action may be properly stated against public officers, such as Mayor Roy and Mr. Johnson. The City argues that this Court should decline to extend the cause of action. The magistrate judge adopted the latter view. We do the same.
The troubled history of the tortious interference with contract theory in Louisiana may be appropriately traced to the year 1902. In that year, the Louisiana Supreme Court issued its opinion in Kline v. Eubanks, in which the plaintiff, a plantation owner, alleged that the defendant induced a farm laborer to breach his services contract. 109 La. 241, 33 So. 211, 212 (1902). The plaintiff sought, and was denied, damages under a Louisiana statute which required a criminal conviction for the act of inducement as a prerequisite to civil recovery. See id.
The Kline court next considered the possibility of awarding the plaintiff relief under La. Civ. C. art. 2315, which provides the general foundation for tort recovery in Louisiana. Specifically, the article states that "[e]very act whatever of man that causes damage to another obliges him by whose fault it happened to repair it." Id.
Finally, in 1989, the Louisiana Supreme Court reexamined its ruling in Kline, and lifted the longstanding bar to allow at least a limited cause of action for tortious interference with contract. This seminal case was set against the backdrop of the 1984 Louisiana World's Fair. 9 to 5 Fashions, Inc. v. Spurney, 538 So.2d 228, 229-30 (La.1989). A nonprofit corporation created to conduct the fair had entered into a contract with a clothing company to supply uniforms for the fair's employees. Id. at 230. The corporation went bankrupt after the fair, and the clothing company was not able to fully collect under the contract. Id.
Subsequently, the clothing company filed suit against Spurney, the chief executive officer of the corporation, alleging that his acts of interference, both intentional and negligent, made the clothing company's performance under the contract "more burdensome and costly." Id. at 230. More specifically, the clothing company argued that Spurney: (1) told his employees to contact other clothing supply companies to determine if any could furnish the uniforms; (2) failed to assign an employee to oversee the design and supply of the uniforms for a significant length of time; and (3) eventually appointed a less experienced employee to coordinate the supply of the uniforms, instead of an employee who had performed that task for a previous fair. See id. at 230.
In deciding the case, the court began with a brief discussion of the basic premise underlying La. Civ. C. art. 2315: "The framers conceived of fault as a breach of a preexisting obligation for which the law orders reparation, when it causes damage to another, and they left it to the courts to determine in each case the existence of an anterior obligation which would make an act constitute fault." Id. at 231. With that premise in mind, the court held that,
Id. The opinion also explicitly overrules Kline, and repudiates the precedents upon which it relied as "outflanked and rendered obsolete by modern economic developments." Id. at 232. Finally, the court explained that the Louisiana Civil Code is commonly applied to issues that have arisen well after its drafting. Id. at 232-33.
What the opinion failed to do is specify the exact scope of this newly available cause of action. The court expressly overturned its "previous expressions barring absolutely any action based on a tortious interference with a contract," but, critically, included the following limiting language in its opinion:
Id. (internal citations omitted). Finally, the court set out five independent elements of the tort:
Id. The proper interpretation of this language is crucial to our determination in this case.
Having reached the necessary legal conclusions, the Spurney, court held that the evidence did not support the plaintiff's claims under the third and fourth elements of the newfound tortious interference claim: that Spurney intended to make the performance of the contract more difficult or costly, and that he acted in excess of his authority or contrary to the interests of the corporation. See id. In light of those conclusions, the justices reversed the decisions of both lower courts, and rendered judgment against the plaintiff. Id. at 235. Thus, this newfound cause of action for tortious interference with contract in Louisiana wound up being first elucidated in a case in which it was found inapplicable.
In the intervening two decades, the Louisiana Supreme Court has offered little guidance regarding the proper scope of its decision in Spurney, save to note its determination to "proceed with caution in expanding [the tortious interference] cause of action." Great Sw. Fire Ins. Co. v. CNA Ins. Cos., 557 So.2d 966, 969 (La. 1990).
In spite of the limited guidance from the Louisiana Supreme Court, however, various other courts have issued interpretations of Spurney, Shortly after the Spurney decision, our United States Fifth Circuit declined to expand the scope of the newly-created tort beyond the context of a private corporate officer. See Am. Waste & Pollution Control Co. v. Browning-Ferris, Inc., 949 F.2d at 1391 (5th Cir.1991). In that case, a parish sanitary landfill commission entered into a contract with the appellant to operate a landfill. Id. at 1385. The appellant argued that another company intentionally induced the commission to breach its contract with the appellant. See id.
The court held that dismissal of the appellant's tortious interference claim was appropriate, because "[t]he requisite duty in Spurney arose out of a corporate officer's narrowly defined duty to those with whom his corporation contracts. The Louisiana courts have refused to find this duty, or obligation, in other circumstances." Id. at 1390. It is important to note that no duty (which would have supported liability for tortious interference) existed between the appellant and the competing company. See id. Nonetheless, the court specifically declined to extend the factual circumstances in which a plaintiff may state a cause of action for tortious interference with contract in Louisiana:
Since 1989, the Fifth Circuit has declined, with broad consistency, to expand the scope of the tort beyond the facts of Spurney, and has often relied upon the status of the alleged tortfeasor as an officer of a private corporation in doing so.
As we have emphasized, courts' reasoning for dismissing tortious interference claims bears added emphasis. Some opinions have focused upon the fiduciary duty of the corporate officer, rather than the officer's position in a private (not a municipal) corporation, as the key element of tortious interference in Louisiana.
Likewise, Louisiana appellate opinions are split on the issue. Some opinions have taken the conservative approach and have refused to extend the doctrine beyond the facts of Spurney.
As a precursor to analyzing Ms. Brown's tortious interference claim, we note once again that the Louisiana Supreme Court has not decided a case which directly addresses the question presented by the City's motion. As such, we must observe the following rules:
Am. Waste & Pollution Control Co., 949 F.2d at 1386 (internal citations omitted).
With these principles in mind, we now consider Ms. Brown's arguments. Ms. Brown objects to the magistrate judge's report and recommendation on three principal grounds: (1) tortious interference claims are not limited under Spurney to officers of private corporations, but may also apply to officers of municipal corporations, because the central element of such claims is the breach of a fiduciary duty; (2) denying Ms. Brown's claim affords undue deference to public officials, and effectively immunizes them from liability for tortious interference; and (3) the magistrate judge improperly shifted the burden of justifying its tortious interference claim to the plaintiff, rather than requiring the defendant, under Fed.R.Civ.P. 12, to show that the claim lacks a valid legal foundation.
Ms. Brown contends that public officials, like Mayor Roy and Mr. Johnson, are subject to liability for tortious interference, because they owe a fiduciary duty to the municipality. The Court agrees that "a public officer owes an undivided duty to the public whom he serves and is not permitted to place himself in a position that will subject him to conflicting duties or cause him to act other than for the best interests of the public." Plaquemines Parish Comm'n Council v. Delta Dev. Co., Inc., 502 So.2d 1034, 1039 (La.1987) (quoting Anderson v. City of Parsons, 209 Kan. 337, 496 P.2d 1333, 1337 (Kan.1972)). In other words, according to Ms. Brown, public officials owe a fiduciary duty to their constituencies and public employers.
As an initial matter, it is unclear, considering the jurisprudence before us, that public officers like Mayor Roy and Mr. Johnson owe third parties any "fiduciary duty" in the legal sense of that term. Such a duty is, however, required for a tortious interference claim. The Louisiana
Nonetheless, even if public officials owe a fiduciary duty to third-party contractors, the Court is unconvinced that any such duty may support a claim for tortious interference under current Louisiana law. Ms. Brown argues that courts have sanctioned claims against various parties on the basis of fiduciary duty alone, such as officers of non-profit corporations
To begin with, the fact that Spurney involved an officer of a non-profit corporation is of no consequence here, because the Louisiana Supreme Court highlighted only the defendant's status as an officer of a corporation. See 538 So.2d at 234. Whether the corporation is a for-profit entity is not mentioned in the opinion. Also, the decision involving officers of a public housing authority contains absolutely no rationale for applying the tort beyond the facts of Spurney. See UniDev, L.L.C., 2008 WL 906308, at *6.
Furthermore, both parties rely upon the lack of jurisprudence which may shed some light on our decision here. No binding precedents explicitly allow or prohibit application of the cause of action to the circumstances of this case. The City points out that no cases have held that tortious interference may properly be applied to a case involving an elected municipal official. Ms. Brown, however, notes that none of the cases cited by the City have refused to extend the cause of action because a corporate officer was not involved; rather, they have done so because a fiduciary relationship was lacking. Therefore, the Court is not bound (except to the extent that the Fifth Circuit jurisprudence has precedential value) by applicable precedent to decide this case in any particular manner.
In the absence of such precedent, the Court is unwilling to extend the cause of action for tortious interference with contract beyond the limited facts of Spurney, We reach this conclusion for a number of reasons, the first of which is the particular language selected by the Louisiana Supreme Court in creating, and limiting, the cause of action. The court first specified that it did not wish "to adopt whole and undigested the fully expanded common law doctrine of interference with contract." Spurney, 538 So.2d at 234. The court's reasoning for this conclusion was that various unsettled questions about the doctrine remained, including "the basis of liability and defense, the types of contract or relationship to be protected, and the kinds of interference that will be actionable." Spurney, 538 So.2d at 234. The next sentence, as we read it, unequivocally confines the scope of the tort to situations involving officers of private corporations: "[i]n the present case we recognize, as set forth particularly herein, only a corporate officer's duty to refrain from intentional and unjustified interference with the contractual relation between his employer and a third person." Id. (emphasis added). The court mentioned only corporate officers, and included the phrase "as set forth particularly herein" as an additional limiting clause in its holding. Id. More clear statements of restraint would be difficult to formulate.
Moreover, what the court did not say in Spurney is arguably just as important as what it did say. The Louisiana Supreme Court did not "recognize ... only a [fiduciary's] duty" to refrain from interference with contract; it recognized a "corporate officer's duty" in that regard. See id. The court did not sanction the cause of action in cases analogous to those involving the corporate officer context; it sanctioned the cause of action "as set forth particularly" in that case alone. Finally, the court did not outline a set of generalized parameters within which appellate and diversity courts could experiment with the tort in various factual settings; instead, it consistently used the terms "officer" and "corporation"
Second, as noted above, it is not the province of this Court to draw bold (and strained) inferences in matters of state law which are, at the very least, unsettled. Although we must attempt to determine how the Louisiana Supreme Court would rule in this case, we may not craft new theories of recovery under Louisiana law. See Am. Waste & Pollution Control Co., 949 F.2d at 1386. Rather, we adhere to the following principle articulated by the Fifth Circuit: "It took the Louisiana Supreme Court almost 90 years to recognize a quite narrow cause of action for tortious contractual interference; it is not for this diversity court to expand that cause of action in the face of Louisiana's expressed unwillingness to do so." Id. at 1390. By most indications, that unwillingness remains largely unchanged more than twenty years after Spurney was decided, and it makes no difference that in this case, our original jurisdiction was grounded in a federal question rather than in diversity.
Third, we reemphasize that no binding precedent explicitly allows us to extend the cause of action to a context beyond the facts of Spurney. Ms. Brown (and some courts) have made much of the following language in American Waste & Pollution Control Co.: "The common thread in Spurney and its progeny is the requisite duty, or obligation, for such a cause of action." Id. at 1384. However, this statement is followed by the court's refusal to extend the Spurney court's reasoning to other factual circumstances: "The requisite duty in Spurney arose out of a corporate officer's narrowly defined duty to those with whom his corporation contracts. The Louisiana courts have refused to find this duty, or obligation, in other circumstances. ..." Id. at 1390. Moreover, the court noted that its decision was only partially dependent upon the fiduciary duty issue: "Accordingly, in making our Erie-guess on this aspect of Louisiana law, and because the requisite duty is lacking, we hold that Louisiana would not allow a claim against [the defendant] for tortious interference with contract." See id. (emphasis added). Therefore, neither this case, nor any other, obligates (or even expressly allows) this Court to expand the scope of the tortious interference doctrine in Louisiana.
Fourth, although Louisiana appellate courts are divided on this issue, the weight of authority in Louisiana appears to favor this Court's interpretation. Even if many or all opinions refusing to extend the tort rely upon the absence of a fiduciary duty, language confining Spurney to its facts is pervasive in the state jurisprudence as well. See n. 9, supra. Cases extending the tort seem to be the exception and not the rule. Our decision here certainly does not rest upon a tally of the "wins and losses" in Louisiana appellate courts for the position of either party. But, it is instructive to note which position seems to carry more sway, particularly because we must consult appellate court opinions when definitive guidance from the state's highest court is lacking. See Herrmann Holdings Ltd., 302 F.3d at 558.
Fifth, those courts which would extend the tort invariably (and improperly) cite to the concept of fiduciary duty. See, e.g., Spencer-Wallington, Inc., 562 So.2d at 1063-64. It is true that the Spurney court rooted the tort in the concept of fault under La. Civ. C. art. 2315, and noted that "[t]he framers conceived of fault as a breach of a preexisting obligation for which the law orders reparation." 538
However, the mere fact that the court derived the new cause of action from the concept of fiduciary duty does not mean that the court intended the cause of action to apply in any situations involving a similar obligation. To the contrary, the court's language refers only to the fiduciary duty borne by corporate officers. See id. Likewise, the court only specifically recognized a cause of action for tortious interference arising out of a corporate officer's obligations. See id. at 234. Therefore, we do not read Spurney as creating an expansive cause of action based upon a breach of any preexisting fiduciary duty. Instead, we read the case as recognizing a cause of action only for a corporate officer's breach of that officer's preexisting duty to refrain from tortiously interfering with a third party's contract, and to serve the best interests of his corporation.
Sixth, while the City does not contest that municipal officers have a fiduciary duty to their employers, we note that the nature of this duty is distinguishable from the corporate officer's duty. A corporate officer's duty is linked to his status as a trusted agent of the corporation; a public official's duty is linked to his commitment to perform a public service on behalf of the municipality and its citizens. Private corporations exist for profit or some charitable purpose; municipal corporations exist to govern and provide services to citizens. Thus, we do not find the nature (and perhaps the scope and extent) of those duties to be necessarily identical.
Lastly, in further analyzing the facts here, we note that the contract in question is not a usual commercial contract but is, rather, a contract for legal services. Such contracts are to an extent sui generis, as there are multiple rules, obligations and standards—including ethical and professional ones—which attach to them. Specifically, there are rules which govern the relationship created in a legal representation arrangement—rules which are quite different from and essentially unrelated in many ways to commercial contracts. Thus, legal services contracts are generally terminable at the behest of the represented party prior to completion of the representation
Ms. Brown next objects to the magistrate judge's reference to "policy considerations" supporting his recommendation to grant the City's motion. In addition to finding that the Spurney decision was limited to its facts, as this Court has now done, the magistrate judge also provided the following rationale for his decision:
(Doc. 383, p. 7). Ms. Brown alleges that, through this brief observation, the magistrate judge has granted absolute immunity to, and cast judges as guardians of, public officials. This result, according to Ms. Brown, contravenes Louisiana statutory and jurisprudential law. We disagree.
It is true that La. R.S. § 2798.1(B) provides a form of qualified immunity to public officers: "Liability shall not be imposed on public entities or their officers or employees based upon the exercise or performance or the failure to exercise or perform their policymaking or discretionary acts when such acts are within the course and scope of their lawful powers and duties." The scope of this immunity, however, was neither mentioned nor impacted by the magistrate judge's opinion. Nor is the statute an issue before this Court.
To the contrary, the magistrate judge made this statement only after concluding, as a matter of law, that "Ms. Brown's allegations do not fall within the narrow parameters of Louisiana's tortious interference cause of action." (Doc. 383, p. 7). The statement merely supports the magistrate judge's vestigial opinion that the Louisiana Supreme Court would not favor extending the tortious interference cause of action to the political arena. It is therefore not an essential element of the magistrate judge's decision in any case.
To be clear, however, this Court's decision does not rest, to any degree, upon any theory of immunity for public officials. This Court merely finds here that the Louisiana Supreme Court's decision in Spurney limits the cause of action for tortious interference to circumstances involving officers of private corporations. Our conclusion
Finally, Ms. Brown contends that the magistrate judge misapplied the burden of proof on this Rule 12(b)(6) motion to dismiss by requiring "the plaintiff—on pain of dismissal—to show that the Fifth Circuit had previously blessed a Spurney cause of action in the municipal-corporation context." (Doc. 387-1, p. 3). Instead, Ms. Brown argues that the City must show that Louisiana courts distinguish between private corporations and municipal corporations, and that such a distinction precludes her tortious interference claim. This argument is unavailing.
First, the magistrate judge did not improperly shift the burden to the plaintiff. Instead, the magistrate judge merely noted that neither the court, nor "[t]he parties," uncovered opinions extending a tortious interference claim to a mayor or a city attorney. (Doc. 383, p. 6). Then, the court held that "[a]bsent explicit authority from the Louisiana Supreme Court or, at the very least a Louisiana appellate court, the undersigned declines to extend Spurney to officers of municipal corporations." (Doc. 383, pp. 6-7). The magistrate judge merely rested his conclusion upon the lack of jurisprudential support for the extension of a doctrine which was not only disfavored, but barred, in this state for the major portion of a century. The court began from the proposition, however, that Louisiana state and federal courts alike have confined Spurney to its facts, meaning that the defendant properly bore (and carried) the burden on its motion.
Nevertheless, this Court has certainly applied the burden properly. Our analysis rested upon (1) the City's citation of cases in which state and federal courts have limited the Spurney decision to its facts, or have at least declined to extend the cause of action to other sets of facts; (2) consideration, and ultimate rejection, of the nonbinding authorities cited by Ms. Brown purporting to extend Spurney beyond its facts; and (3) our own independent analysis of the interplay between the jurisprudence cited by both parties. The City established that Ms. Brown has failed "to state a claim upon which relief can be granted." Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(6). Ms. Brown has failed to refute that showing, and to establish that her "[f]actual allegations... [are sufficient to] raise a right to relief above the speculative level." Bell Atl. Corp., 550 U.S. at 555, 127 S.Ct. 1955. Therefore, the City's motion must be granted.
Ms. Brown's claim has required the Court to delve into an unsettled aspect of Louisiana law. In such circumstances, the Court is appropriately loathe to reach conclusions which are not firmly supported in state law, and to draw inferences from persuasive authorities which are not otherwise warranted. As such, the balance of Ms. Brown's claims may move forward at this point. Ms. Brown's claim for tortious interference with contract, however, is not viable under Louisiana law as it stands. Therefore, the City's Rule 12(b)(6) Motion to Dismiss Intervener's Tortious Interference with Contract Claims (Doc. 158) will be GRANTED, the magistrate judge's Report on Motion to Dismiss (Doc. 383) will be ADOPTED IN PART, as specified herein, and the Recommendation (Doc. 383) ADOPTED IN FULL.
Subsequently, and without written reasons, the Louisiana Supreme Court reversed the judgment of the appellate court, reinstated the trial court's judgment overruling the defendant attorney's exception of no cause of action, and remanded the case to the trial court for further proceedings. See 584 So.2d 665 (La. 1991). No further history of the case is reported. However, a number of courts have interpreted the Chaffin decision as support for a tortious interference action in the context of a legal services contract. See, e.g., Dodson v. Spiliada Maritime Corp., 951 F.2d 40, 44 (5th Cir.1992).
However, we have neither written reasons for the court's decision in Chaffin, nor written opinions in the case subsequent to the court's remand. Moreover, the Louisiana Supreme Court limited a subsequent case from the same circuit, which held that "Chaffin clearly establishes that, in some circumstances, a tort action may lie for unwarranted interference by an attorney with the attorney-client contract of another attorney." Krebs v. Mull, 727 So.2d 564, 568 (La.App. 1st Cir. 1998). The Louisiana Supreme Court subsequently overruled that case, and held as follows:
Scheffler v. Adams and Reese, LLP, 950 So.2d 641, 653 (La.2007). Aside from this holding, this Court's review of the jurisprudence revealed no other reported decision in which a cause of action for tortious interference with a legal services contract has been allowed. We thus find the Louisiana Supreme Court's "approval" of the doctrine in this context tenuous at best. And to the extent that Chaffin conflicts with more recent decisions purporting to limit tortious interference to the facts of Spurney—particularly the Louisiana Supreme Court's decision in Cowen v. Steiner, 701 So.2d 140 (La. 1997), reversing, without written reasons, an appellate court's judgment extending the cause of action beyond the corporate officer context—we find the decision anomalous.