Tueme v Lezama 2023 NY Slip Op 03036 [217 AD3d 715] June 7, 2023
Appellate Division, Second Department touches on false arrest, malicious prosecution, negligent infliction of emotional distress and violation of Judiciary Law 487.

One of the claims against the attorneys was that the attorney gave false testimony in a criminal case against him. This was determined to be insufficient to invoke Judiciary Law 487,

“Further, the Supreme Court erred in denying those branches of the attorney defendants’ motion which were pursuant to CPLR 3211 (a) to dismiss the causes of action to recover damages for intentional infliction of emotional distress and violation of Judiciary Law § 487 insofar [*3]as asserted against them. With respect to the intentional infliction of emotional distress cause of action, the improper conduct alleged was not “so outrageous in character, and so extreme in degree, as to go beyond all possible bounds of decency, and to be regarded as atrocious, and utterly intolerable in a civilized community” (Howell v New York Post Co., 81 NY2d 115, 122 [1993] [internal quotation marks omitted]; see Matthaus v Hadjedj, 148 AD3d 425, 425-426 [2017]; Zapata v Tufenkjian, 123 AD3d 814, 816 [2014]). With respect to the Judiciary Law § 487 cause of action, the plaintiff failed to allege with specificity any material misstatements of fact made by the attorney defendants in the divorce action with the intent to deceive that court (see Bill Birds, Inc. v Stein Law Firm, P.C., 35 NY3d 173, 178 [2020]; see also Looff v Lawton, 97 NY 478, 482 [1884]). Moreover, to the extent the plaintiff alleged that Navins gave false testimony as a witness in a criminal case against him, such an allegation cannot properly form the basis of a Judiciary Law § 487 cause of action (see generally Altman v DiPreta, 204 AD3d 965, 969 [2022]).”

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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.