Aloy v. Mash
Supreme Court of California
38 Cal. 3d 413 (1985)
Relevant factsFree
Mash (defendant) represented Aloy (plaintiff) in her 1971 divorce but never asserted her possible community-property interest in her husband's vested military pension, relying on a single 1941 case and unable to say whether he knew the pension vested after 20 years of service; when Aloy sued for malpractice years later, Mash argued the law was unsettled in 1971 and that a later Supreme Court decision (McCarty) would have exempted the pension from community property anyway.
IssueFree
Whether failure to assert a client's interest in community property, based on lack of familiarity with the governing law, constitutes negligent representation.