Palmeri v Wilkie Farr & Gallagher LLP 2017 NY Slip Op 05794 Decided on July 25, 2017
Appellate Division, First Department is one of those rare cases where a subsidiary cause of action survives, while the major causes of action are all dismissed. In the legal malpractice world, the major cause of action is LM, while the subsidiary causes are breach of contract or breach of fiduciary duty. The latter two are often dismissed as “duplicitive” of the LM cause of action. Here, the opposite obtains.
“Order, Supreme Court, New York County (Eileen Bransten, J.), entered November 5, 2015, which, to the extent appealed from as limited by the briefs, granted defendant’s motion for summary judgment dismissing the complaint, unanimously modified, on the law, to deny in part defendant’s motion for summary judgment, and reinstate the first cause of action for breach of fiduciary duty, and otherwise affirmed, without costs.”
“Defendant moved under CPLR 3212 to dismiss the complaint as time-barred and for failure to state a claim. Plaintiff cross-moved for summary judgment in his favor. In its decision, which it read into the record, the IAS court found that all six of plaintiff’s claims were premised on the same operative facts and sought identical monetary damages. Accordingly, the IAS court “merged” plaintiff’s claims for gross negligence, breach of contract and breach of the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing into his legal malpractice claim, leaving for consideration only that claim and claims based on breach of fiduciary duty.
The IAS court then dismissed both claims as untimely. Because plaintiff sought purely monetary damages, the court applied the three-year statute of limitations to the breach of fiduciary duty claim, rather than the six-year period. The court held that the claim was time-barred, since plaintiff filed it in February 2013, more than three years after defendant represented him from January through June 2009.
To begin, the motion court properly dismissed plaintiff’s claims for gross negligence, breach of contract, and breach of the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing as duplicative of his legal malpractice claim, given that they are all based on the same facts and seek the same relief (Sun Graphics Corp. v Levy, Davis & Maher, LLP, 94 AD3d 669 [1st Dept 2012]).
Plaintiff’s claim for legal malpractice, in turn, is untimely. Claims for legal malpractice are subject to a three-year statute of limitations and accrue when the malpractice is committed, not when the client learns of it (Lincoln Place, LLC v RVP Consulting, Inc., 70 AD3d 594 [1st Dept 2010], lv denied 15 NY3d 710 [2010]; CPLR 214[6]). Plaintiff’s legal malpractice claim first accrued on or about June 25, 2009, when defendant terminated its legal representation of him, but continued to represent Ramius in the ongoing FINRA investigation. He did not, however, file his claim until February 15, 2013, more than three years later.
In addition, the motion court correctly dismissed the claim for aiding and abetting a breach of fiduciary duty, as plaintiff is collaterally estopped from relitigating the question of whether an attorney-client relationship existed between him and his employer’s in-house counsel. The identical issue was decided in the FINRA proceeding and plaintiff had a full and fair opportunity to litigate it before FINRA (see Jeffreys v Griffin, 1 NY3d 34, 39 [2003]; Auqui v Seven Thirty One Ltd. Partnership, 22 NY3d 246, 255 [2013]).
However, the IAS court should have permitted the breach of fiduciary duty claim to proceed. The IAS court correctly noted that the claim was subject to a three-year statute of limitations. The court was mistaken, however, in finding that the allegedly wrongful conduct ended on June 25, 2009, when defendant unilaterally terminated its representation of plaintiff. On the contrary, defendant’s conduct extended through at least June 29, 2011, during which time it represented Ramius and its employees in their participation at plaintiff’s FINRA disciplinary hearing.”
“Here, plaintiff has presented evidence of a “continuing wrong,” which is “deemed to have accrued on the date of the last wrongful act” (Leonhard v United States, 633 F2d 599, 613 [2d Cir. 1980], cert denied 451 US 908 [1981]; Harvey, 34 AD3d at 364). Indeed, the record contains evidence sufficient to create an issue of fact as to whether defendant breached its fiduciary obligations to plaintiff after June 2009 and well into June 2011 during its ongoing representation of the Ramius parties.”