Nyitrai v. Bonis

Macgill, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. This is an appeal from a summary judgment entered in favor of the administrator on the ground that appellant’s suit was barred by the Statute of Limitations. Code (1972 Repl. Vol.), Art. 57, § 1.

On September 16, 1966, Leslie Engel died intestate, a resident of Baltimore County, survived by a wife and daughter, his sole next of kin, who were residents of Hungary. On October 5, 1966, the appellant, Maria Nyitrai, and her sister, Irma Pallay, who purported to be nieces of the decedent but who were, in fact, nieces of a woman with whom the decedent had been living and who had died before the decedent, made an agreement with a lawyer (not counsel in this case) whereby he was to serve as administrator of Mr. Engel’s estate for a fee of 10 per cent of the gross assets. Letters of Administration were granted to this lawyer by the Orphans’ Court of Baltimore County on October 6, 1966. On April 12, 1967, the appellant entered into an agreement with the same lawyer whereby he was to act as her attorney in connection with a claim for “nursing services” rendered by her to the decedent.

She was to pay the lawyer 25 per cent of the amount collected. Such a claim was ²⁹⁷ prepared and filed in the Orphans’ Court. The total amount claimed for such services was $15,650.00 but the appellant indicated her willingness to accept $15,000.00 in satisfaction of it. The administrator, without disclosing the fact that he was acting as attorney for the appellant in the matter, petitioned the Orphans’ Court for authority to settle the claim for $15,000.00.

On April 19, 1967, that court passed an ex parte order authorizing the administrator to make settlement in the amount proposed. Around this time, the record does not disclose when, the fact that the decedent was survived by a widow and a daughter living in Hungary became known, as well as their identity. The administrator filed his seeond and final administration account on May 4, 1967. The gross estate amounted to $21,372.52, and after the deduction of appellant’s claim, as well as taxes and expenses, the balance was shown as distributable to the wife and daughter of the decedent.

Thereafter the heirs of the decedent retained an attorney, the appellee, who filed exceptions to the appellant’s claim. Although the date of the filing of the exceptions does not appear in the record, it was stated in the appellant’s brief and in argument before this Court that the exceptions were filed on June 19, 1967. On September 7, 1967, the administrator wrote to the appellant informing her that the Orphans’ Court had requested that he no longer represent her in the matter of her claim for nursing services and that she should retain other counsel. He added that “All the legal work which I have rendered to date is completely valid as to your said claim” and that “I am still the Administrator of the Estate of Leslie Engel, Deceased.” In the following month the appellant retained her present counsel who entered into negotiations with counsel for the appellee toward settlement of the claim.

It appears undisputed that during the settlement negotiations there were no inducements made to the appellant on behalf of the heirs not to file suit or any indications that any legal defense to the claim, including limitations, would be waived if no settlement ²⁹⁸ was reached. No settlement, in fact, was reached. On April 13, 1970, the Orphans’ Court removed the original administrator and in his stead appointed the appellee who, on the same date, gave written notice to the appellant that her claim was denied. On June 4, 1970, this suit was filed.

Judge Turnbull, in granting the motion for summary judgment, found that the appellant, who did not speak English and who did not understand the duplicitous position of her original counsel, had not conspired with him as to the manner of asserting her claim. He found, nevertheless, that the appellee was not estopped from asserting the defense of limitations. The first contention made on behalf of the appellant was that her suit was not barred by the statute of limitations referred to because it was not brought to her attention that her claim was disputed until exceptions were filed to it on June 19, 1967 and, accounting from that date, three years had not elapsed at the time of the filing of her suit. She points out that until that date the then administrator had acknowledged the claim and, in effect, had promised to pay it, by his acts in petitioning for authority to settle it, by including it in his second and final administration account and by the statement in his letter of September 7, 1967 that the legal work he had rendered to. date was “completely valid as to her said claim”.

We do not think that the statement in the letter, strictly speaking, constituted an acknowledgment by the administrator of the claim. The letter was not written by the attorney in his capacity as administrator but in his capacity as counsel for the appellant in connection with her claim against the estate and, regardless of what impression the appellant may have received from the language, the work characterized as “valid” referred to that work done by the attorney in his individual capacity, not as administrator of the estate. We think that this is made clear by the sentence immediately preceding the sentence quoted “Of course, no fee is due me for my legal services ²⁹⁹ in connection with your claim against the Estate of Leslie Engel, Deceased”. It appears, therefore, that the