The name is arresting and the crusade is notable.  The entire case falls, once again, on a technicality.  What happens when a complaint but no summons starts the case off?  Dealy-Doe-Eyes Maddux v Schur  2016 NY Slip Op 03931  Decided on May 19, 2016  Appellate Division, Third Department tells us that:

“For more than a decade, plaintiff has pursued an ongoing course of litigation seeking to hold defendant liable for his alleged legal malpractice. One such action for legal malpractice proceeded to trial and was dismissed by Supreme Court upon defendant’s motion at the close of plaintiff’s proof [FN1]. Thereafter, defendant moved to dismiss this purported legal malpractice action on the ground that, among other things, plaintiff failed to file a summons or summons with notice.

Supreme Court granted defendant’s motion, and plaintiff now appeals.

We affirm. “An action is commenced by filing a summons and complaint or summons with notice in accordance with [CPLR 2102]” (CPLR 304 [a]). The failure to file the papers required to commence an action constitutes a nonwaivable, jurisdictional defect (see Matter of Miller v Waters, 51 AD3d 113, 116 [2008]; Sangiacomo v County of Albany, 302 AD2d 769, 771 [2003]), and such a defect is not subject to correction under CPLR 2001 (see Goldenberg v Westchester County Health Care Corp., 16 NY3d 323, 328 [2011]; Fox v City of Utica, 133 AD3d 1229, 1230 [2015]; DeJoy v Ehmann, 114 AD3d 1288, 1289 [2014], lv denied 23 NY3d 901 [2014]). Here, although plaintiff purchased an index number and filed a complaint, she never filed a summons or summons with notice. Given plaintiff’s failure, the purported action was a nullity, and Supreme Court properly dismissed it for want of subject matter jurisdiction (see O’Brien v Contreras, 126 AD3d 958, 958 [2015];Sangiacomo v County of Albany, 302 AD2d at 772). Moreover, to the extent that the complaint raised claims that were identical to those previously litigated and dismissed after a trial, such claims were barred by principles of res [*2]judicata (see Bluff Point Townhouse Owners Assn., Inc. v Kapsokefalos, 129 AD3d 1267, 1267-1268 [2015], lv denied 26 NY3d 910 [2015]; Wasson v Bond, 97 AD3d 1093, 1094 [2012]). Plaintiff’s remaining contentions have been examined and found to be without merit.”

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Andrew Lavoott Bluestone

Andrew Lavoott Bluestone has been an attorney for 40 years, with a career that spans criminal prosecution, civil litigation and appellate litigation. Mr. Bluestone became an Assistant District Attorney in Kings County in 1978, entered private practice in 1984 and in 1989 opened…

Andrew Lavoott Bluestone has been an attorney for 40 years, with a career that spans criminal prosecution, civil litigation and appellate litigation. Mr. Bluestone became an Assistant District Attorney in Kings County in 1978, entered private practice in 1984 and in 1989 opened his private law office and took his first legal malpractice case.

Since 1989, Bluestone has become a leader in the New York Plaintiff’s Legal Malpractice bar, handling a wide array of plaintiff’s legal malpractice cases arising from catastrophic personal injury, contracts, patents, commercial litigation, securities, matrimonial and custody issues, medical malpractice, insurance, product liability, real estate, landlord-tenant, foreclosures and has defended attorneys in a limited number of legal malpractice cases.

Bluestone also took an academic role in field, publishing the New York Attorney Malpractice Report from 2002-2004.  He started the “New York Attorney Malpractice Blog” in 2004, where he has published more than 4500 entries.

Mr. Bluestone has written 38 scholarly peer-reviewed articles concerning legal malpractice, many in the Outside Counsel column of the New York Law Journal. He has appeared as an Expert witness in multiple legal malpractice litigations.

Mr. Bluestone is an adjunct professor of law at St. John’s University College of Law, teaching Legal Malpractice.  Mr. Bluestone has argued legal malpractice cases in the Second Circuit, in the New York State Court of Appeals, each of the four New York Appellate Divisions, in all four of  the U.S. District Courts of New York and in Supreme Courts all over the state.  He has also been admitted pro haec vice in the states of Connecticut, New Jersey and Florida and was formally admitted to the US District Court of Connecticut and to its Bankruptcy Court all for legal malpractice matters. He has been retained by U.S. Trustees in legal malpractice cases from Bankruptcy Courts, and has represented municipalities, insurance companies, hedge funds, communications companies and international manufacturing firms. Mr. Bluestone regularly lectures in CLEs on legal malpractice.

Based upon his professional experience Bluestone was named a Diplomate and was Board Certified by the American Board of Professional Liability Attorneys in 2008 in Legal Malpractice. He remains Board Certified.  He was admitted to The Best Lawyers in America from 2012-2019.  He has been featured in Who’s Who in Law since 1993.

In the last years, Mr. Bluestone has been featured for two particularly noteworthy legal malpractice cases.  The first was a settlement of an $11.9 million dollar default legal malpractice case of Yeo v. Kasowitz, Benson, Torres & Friedman which was reported in the NYLJ on August 15, 2016. Most recently, Mr. Bluestone obtained a rare plaintiff’s verdict in a legal malpractice case on behalf of the City of White Plains v. Joseph Maria, reported in the NYLJ on February 14, 2017. It was the sole legal malpractice jury verdict in the State of New York for 2017.

Bluestone has been at the forefront of the development of legal malpractice principles and has contributed case law decisions, writing and lecturing which have been recognized by his peers.  He is regularly mentioned in academic writing, and his past cases are often cited in current legal malpractice decisions. He is recognized for his ample writings on Judiciary Law § 487, a 850 year old statute deriving from England which relates to attorney deceit.