We reported on this case when it was decided in Supreme Court and now after a couple of years it has been decided in the Appellate Division in Altman v Orseck 2025 NY Slip Op 00940 Decided on February 19, 2025 Appellate Division, Second Department.

“The plaintiffs, Charles Altman and Altman Law Group, LLC, commenced this action, among other things, to recover damages for violation of Judiciary Law § 487 against, among others, the defendants Richard S. DiPreta and DiPreta Law Firm, LLP (hereinafter together the defendants). The defendants moved, inter alia, pursuant to CPLR 3211(a) to dismiss the first cause of action, alleging violation of Judiciary Law § 487, insofar as asserted against them. In an order dated January 10, 2023, the Supreme Court, among other things, granted that branch of the motion only to the extent of directing dismissal of so much of the first cause of action as was predicated upon events occurring prior to April 24, 2016, insofar as asserted against them by the plaintiff Altman Law Group, LLC. The defendants appeal, and we affirm.

“Pursuant to CPLR 3211(a)(5), a party may move to dismiss a cause of action based on the doctrine of res judicata or collateral estoppel” (Joseph v Bank of N.Y. Mellon, 219 AD3d 596, 597; see Tracey v Deutsche Bank Natl. Trust Co., 187 AD3d 815, 817). “Under the doctrine of res judicata, or claim preclusion, a disposition on the merits bars litigation between the same parties, or those in privity with them, of a cause of action arising out of the same transaction or series of transactions as a cause of action that either was raised or could have been raised in the prior proceeding” (Capital One, N.A. v Trubitsky, 206 AD3d 608, 610 [internal quotation marks omitted]; see Matter of B.Z. Chiropractic, P.C. v Allstate Ins. Co., 197 AD3d 144, 152). “The doctrine of collateral estoppel, a narrower species of res judicata, precludes a party from relitigating in a subsequent action or proceeding an issue clearly raised in a prior action . . . and decided against that [*2]party or those in privity, whether or not the tribunals or causes of action are the same” (Ryan v New York Tel. Co., 62 NY2d 494, 500 [emphasis omitted]; see Capital One, N.A. v Trubitsky, 206 AD3d at 611).

Here, contrary to the defendants’ contention, the issues raised in the instant action as to the defendants’ alleged violation of Judiciary Law § 487 could not have been raised in a prior action between the parties and were not necessarily decided in the prior action (see Altman v DiPreta, 204 AD3d 965). Thus, neither res judicata nor collateral estoppel bars the plaintiffs from litigating the instant Judiciary Law § 487 cause of action against the defendants (see Simmons v Jones Law Group, LLC, 214 AD3d 835, 837; Matter of Arcamone-Makinano v Perlmutter, 196 AD3d 479, 481-482).”