## Facts

- Elston Cannon sued Jones Motor Company in Illinois state court for personal injuries.
- Jones and its insurers retained Holtkamp, Liese, Beckemeier & Childress, P.C., and attorney Paul B. Lee to defend the case.
- Illinois procedure required payment of a jury fee with a jury demand.
- Defense counsel filed a jury demand but failed to timely pay the required fee, resulting in waiver of the right to a jury trial.
- The case proceeded to a bench trial before a judge reputed to favor plaintiffs in personal-injury cases.
- The court entered judgment for Cannon for $2.8 million; the parties later settled for $2.5 million.
- Jones and its excess insurer, Protective Insurance Company, sued the attorneys for malpractice, alleging a jury would have awarded about $500,000 and seeking roughly $2 million in alleged overpayment.
- Plaintiffs offered expert opinion testimony predicting a substantially lower jury verdict.
- The federal district court (diversity; Illinois law) granted summary judgment for defendants.

## Issues

1. In an Illinois legal-malpractice action based on loss of a procedural entitlement (jury trial), must the plaintiff prove the negligence caused an unjust substantive result rather than merely a less favorable outcome?
2. Is expert testimony predicting what a hypothetical jury would have awarded sufficient evidence of causation and damages to defeat summary judgment?
3. (Alternative ground) Does an excess insurer without a duty to defend have standing to sue defense counsel for malpractice?

## Decision

- The Seventh Circuit affirmed summary judgment for the law firm and attorney.
- The court held that, under Illinois malpractice principles, loss of a procedural right is actionable only if it caused an unjust substantive result (often framed as showing the “wrong party won” or an otherwise erroneous outcome).
- The plaintiffs’ evidence—an expert’s prediction of a lower jury award—was too speculative and did not show that the bench judgment or settlement was unjust or legally erroneous.
- Defendants’ “contingent cross-appeal” was treated as improper; any arguments within it were considered only as potential alternative grounds for affirmance and were not necessary to the result.

## Legal Principles

- Legal malpractice under Illinois law requires proof of duty, breach, proximate causation, and actual damages, typically through a “case within a case” showing that the client would have obtained a better result absent the attorney’s negligence.
- When malpractice is predicated on losing a procedural entitlement (such as a jury trial), the plaintiff must show the procedural error produced an unjust substantive outcome, not merely that a different decisionmaker might have been more favorable.
- Predictive expert testimony about how a hypothetical jury would likely value a case, without evidence that the bench result was legally or factually wrong, is insufficient to establish causation and damages at summary judgment.

## Conclusion

Because the plaintiffs could not show that the loss of a jury trial caused an unjust or erroneous outcome—as opposed to a speculative difference in valuation—their malpractice claim failed as a matter of law, and summary judgment for defendants was affirmed.


Jones Motor Co. v. Holtkamp, Liese, Beckemeier & Childress, P.C., 197 F.3d 1190 (7th Cir. 1999)