Case Caption: In Re: Lynch Case Number: SCT-CIV-2024-0001Date: 06/24/2025Author: Swan, Ive Arlington Citation: 2025 VI 14Summary: Concerning the denial of an attorney’s motion asserting a charging lien for payment of his claim for attorney’s fees and expenses in a personal injury matter from settlement funds that had been paid into the registry of the Superior Court, after conducting the three-factor analysis called for by Banks v. Int’l Rental & Leasing Corp., 55 V.I. 967 (V.I. 2011), the Supreme Court of the United States Virgin Islands holds that recognizing such liens as a matter of common law would be the best rule to adopt, premised in part on the Superior Court’s discussion and analysis of the issue in Go Fast Charters, LLC v. Texaco Caribbean, Inc., 78 V.I. 24 (V.I. Super. Ct. 2023) and because it would be beneficial for both attorneys and litigants of meager means. However, attorneys’ charging liens are not to supersede or to take priority over other parties’ statutory liens or right to the recovery or to the judgment proceeds or funds, when a statute explicitly and unambiguously grants a third party priority to the recovery or to the judgment proceeds or funds. Even so, because the attorney in the underlying personal injury matter removed himself from the representation of the plaintiffs by filing a motion to withdraw, which was granted before the matter was settled and before the settlement amount was paid into the Superior Court registry, to reenter the case, he would have needed to act as an intervener. Yet, the attorney did not apply for intervention at any time after his motion to withdraw was granted, and neither his February 14, 2023 notice of claim nor his June 20, 2023 motion asserting a charging lien made any mention of intervention or followed the requirements for motions to intervene as delineated in V.I. R. CIV. P. 24(c). Moreover, neither of these filings could be construed as being in the nature of a motion to intervene because neither could be treated as timely, as both were filed after the stipulation of dismissal was filed on February 13, 2023, which effectively closed the case pursuant to V.I. R. CIV. P. 41(a)(1)-(2). Accordingly, the attorney had no standing to pursue a charging lien, as he was no longer affiliated with the case when he filed his notice of claim, nor had he properly filed a motion to intervene. The Superior Court’s order denying the attorney’s motion asserting a charging lien for payment of his claim for fees and expenses is affirmed.Attachment: Open Document or Opinion