Fidelity & Deposit Co. v. L. Bucki & Son Lumber Co.

Background

A lumber company (the Bucki Company) had much of its mill and goods seized under two attachment writs after another firm (the Atlantic Company) sued over alleged contract breaches. The attachments put a lien on the mill and temporarily removed personal property. Forthcoming bonds and later proceedings dissolved the attachments. A jury found $7,500 was the reasonable value of the legal fees incurred to secure the dissolution, but the trial court refused to include that sum. The Florida Court of Appeals ordered the fee added, and the United States Supreme Court reviewed whether those fees could be recovered.

Reasoning

The main question was whether Florida law allows recovery of attorney fees spent to dissolve an attachment and what damages the bond obligor must cover. The Court relied on Florida decisions holding that reasonable counsel fees and expenses in procuring dissolution are elements of damage on attachment bonds. It held that such liability must be enforced even if the case is tried in federal court and that the surety agreed to pay damages resulting directly from the attachments. The Court also approved the trial court’s exclusion of speculative evidence about future profits and credit injury, limiting recoverable damages to harms directly caused by the attachment’s detention and taking of property.

Real world impact

Businesses subject to attachments, their sureties, and lawyers now have clearer guidance: reasonable legal fees to undo improper attachments can be recovered in Florida bond actions, but courts will not award speculative future profits or remote losses not directly caused by the attachment. The ruling applies in federal cases brought on state attachment bonds as well.