We’ve often asserted anecdotally that there are far more dismissals at the pleading stage in legal malpractice than in other areas of the law.  Compare, for example, dismissals in medical malpractice.  We believe that there are almost none.  There are a lot of summary judgment dismissals in legal malpractice as well.  Here, in Leeder v Antonucci
2021 NY Slip Op 03978 Decided on June 17, 2021 Appellate Division, Fourth Department we some of both.

“Memorandum: Plaintiff commenced this action seeking damages for alleged legal malpractice arising from defendant’s representation of plaintiff in two separate matters. On a prior appeal from an order and judgment granting defendant’s cross motion for summary judgment dismissing the complaint, this Court modified the order and judgment by denying the cross motion in part and reinstating plaintiff’s second cause of action (estate cause of action)—which alleged malpractice in defendant’s handling of an estate accounting proceeding—on the ground that plaintiff raised a triable issue of fact whether that cause of action was untimely (Leeder v Antonucci, 174 AD3d 1469, 1470-1471 [4th Dept 2019]). This Court then remitted the matter to Supreme Court to address that part of the cross motion seeking summary judgment dismissing the estate cause of action on the ground that plaintiff failed to sufficiently allege damages on that cause of action (id. at 1471).

Upon remittal, the court granted that part of the cross motion seeking summary judgment dismissing the estate cause of action, concluding that defendant established that plaintiff’s damages claim was speculative and that plaintiff failed to raise a triable issue of fact in opposition. In appeal No. 1, plaintiff appeals from an order and judgment granting the cross motion to that extent and dismissing the remainder of the complaint. In appeal No. 2, plaintiff appeals from an order denying his motion for leave to reargue and renew his opposition to defendant’s cross motion with respect to the estate cause of action.

Addressing appeal No. 1, we conclude that the court properly granted the cross motion. “[A] necessary element of a cause of action for legal malpractice is that the attorney’s negligence caused a loss that resulted in actual and ascertainable damages” (New Kayak Pool Corp. v Kavinoky Cook LLP, 125 AD3d 1346, 1348 [4th Dept 2015] [internal quotation marks omitted]; see Leeder, 174 AD3d at 1469). Furthermore, “[c]onclusory allegations of damages or injuries predicated on speculation cannot suffice for a malpractice action” (New Kayak Pool Corp., 125 AD3d at 1348 [internal quotation marks omitted]). Here, defendant met his initial burden on the cross motion by establishing that plaintiff’s allegations of damages with respect to the estate cause of action are speculative (see id.Lincoln Trust v Spaziano, 118 AD3d 1399, 1401-1402 [4th Dept 2014]). In opposition, plaintiff failed to raise a triable issue of fact (see generally Alvarez v Prospect Hosp., 68 NY2d 320, 324 [1986]). With respect to plaintiff’s opposition, we perceive no error in the court’s rejection of the estate account summary that plaintiff submitted, [*2]which was purportedly prepared by a retained expert. Plaintiff did not submit the summary until nearly a month after the original oral argument on defendant’s cross motion (see Kopeloff v Arctic Cat, Inc., 84 AD3d 890, 890-891 [2d Dept 2011]). Contrary to plaintiff’s contention, the submission was untimely. The fact that the deadline in the court’s scheduling order for disclosure of expert witnesses had not yet passed did not relieve plaintiff of his burden to “lay bare his proof and show that a genuine question of fact exists” in opposition to the cross motion for summary judgment (Oot v Home Ins. Co. of Ind., 244 AD2d 62, 71 [4th Dept 1998]; see also CPLR 3212 [f]). In any event, the estate account summary is conclusory, speculative, and insufficient to raise a triable issue of fact (see generally Feldmeier v Feldmeier Equip., Inc., 164 AD3d 1093, 1099 [4th Dept 2018]).”

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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.