We’ve written about Judiciary Law section 487 before, and have an article in the New York Law Journal awaiting publication.  Like an appellate litigant who reads a new and important case the morning of oral argument, we came across the Amalfitano v. Rosenberg case from the Court of Appeals today.  It is an opinion that traces the statute back to 1275 and the time of the Magna Carta (1215)  Remembering that our law derives from the Norman conquest (1066);  that’s really a long time ago.

In Amalfitano v. Rosenberg the court first re-itereated the ancient origins of this statute, which they determined was "the modern day counterpart of a statute dating from the first decades after Magna Carta, its language virtually (and remarkably) unchanged from that of a law adopted by New York’s Legislature two years before the United States Constitution was ratified."

They traced the law from the First Statute of Westminster, adopted by the "Parliament summoned by King Edward of England in 1275."  500 years later, the NY Legislature adopted a law almost identical in 1787.  (L 1787, ch 36, section 5)

The statute followed, and continued through a series of statutory revisions to today’s Judiciary Law section 487.

Tomorrow:  the history through the 1800’s to today and application in state and federal courts.