Sanders Equities LLC v Maldonado 2025 NY Slip Op 34592(U) December 17, 2025
Supreme Court, Nassau County Docket Number: Index No. 605681/2022
Judge: Sharon M.J. Gianelli is the only decision we remember where plaintiff was wholly successful, obtained an inquest, and received legal malpractice damages, breach of fiduciary duty damages, disgorgement of previously paid fees damages as well as Judiciary law 487 treble damages. Wow.

The discussion by the judge is too long for a blog article, but here are some of the high points.

“This is a damages inquest resulting from three written Decisions and Orders of this Court following a series of defaults by Defendants Kevin Maldonado (“Maldonado”) and Kevin Maldonado and Associates, P.C. d/b/a Kevin Maldonado & Associates d/b/a Kevin
Maldonado & Partners LLC (the “Firm”) (collectively, “Defendants”).
In the first Decision and Order, this Court ruled on the Sanders Entities’ motion to strike,
to preclude, or to compel under CPLR 3124 (3). The Court concluded that Maldonado and the Firm “have shown themselves overall to be evasive, uncooperative, and dilatory” after ears to produce disclosure, ruling that they “have just about earned” the
“drastic steps” of “[s]striking and/or preclusion.”
But the Court granted them “one additional opportunity” to “fully comply with all
outstanding discovery” within “thirty (30) days from the date of entry of this Decision and Order,” with “leave” for Plaintiffs (hereinafter the “Sanders Entities”) to “re-apply” for disclosure sanctions should Maldonado and the Firm “fail to comply with this Decision and Order” (Sanders Equities LLC v Maldonado, 2024 NY Slip Op 34593[U] [Sup Ct, Nassau County Oct. 7, 2024, Gianelli, J.]; NYSCEF Doc. No. 170). The Court’s “one
additional opportunity” became three, this Court extending its original deadline from
November 8, 2024 to January 3, 2025, then from January 3, 2025 to January 10, 2025
(see NYSCEF Doc. No. 181, ,i,i 8-22). Maldonado and the Firm never complied with this
Court’s directives, and the Sanders Entities moved for leave to renew.
In the second Decision and Order, this Court ruled on the Sanders Entities’ motion,
pursuant to CPLR 2221 (e), for leave to renew their prior motion, pursuant to CPLR 3124
(3), to strike Maldonado and the Firm’s Answer. This Court ruled: “Defendants
Maldonado and the Firm have not only been afforded numerous opportunities to comply with the Court’s Orders, including three (3) final warnings, Defendants Maldonado and the Firm have repeatedly and intentionally failed to comply, without reasonable explanation.” The Court “Granted” the Sanders Entities’ motion to strike Maldonado and the Firm’s Answer for “willful and contumacious refusal to comply with required discovery” (Sanders Equities LLC v Maldonado, 2025 NY Slip Op 30694[U] [Sup Ct, Nassau County Mar. 3, 2025, Gianelli, J.]; NYSCEF Doc. No. 246).
In the third Decision and Order, this Court ruled on the Sanders Entities’ motion,
pursuant to CPLR 3212, for partial summary judgment on liability. The Court held that
“the Court’s striking of Defendants’ Answer for failure to comply with discovery directives is tantamount to a liability determination favorable to Plaintiffs. As such, no triable issues of fact remain on the issue of liability.” “Consequently,” the Court held, “in accordance with New York case law, Defendants are considered to have admitted liability.” The Court “Granted” partial summary judgment against Maldonado and the Firm “on the First, Second, Third, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, Tenth, and Eleventh Causes of Action in the Verified Complaint,” and ordered that “an inquest to assess Plaintiffs’ damages shall be held in person on October 8, 2025 at 9:30 a.m. before Hon. Jeffrey S. Brown (Ret.) at the Nassau County Supreme Court” (Sanders Equities LLC v Maldonado, 2025 NY Slip Op 32439[U]

[Sup Ct, Nassau County, July 2, 2025, Gianelli, J.]; NYSCEF Doc. No. 273).
On October 8, 2025, on the day of the damages inquest, Maldonado and the Firm
defaulted again, declining to appear in Court to defend against a damages award.”

“The First Cause of Action for Attorney Deceit/ Judiciary Law §487

This Court has granted the Sanders Entities partial summary judgment on liability on the First Cause of Action for Attorney Deceit/ Judiciary Law§ 487 (see Sanders Equities LLC v Maldonado, 2025 NY Slip Op 32439[U] [N.Y. Sup Ct, Nassau County 2025]; NYSCEF
Doc. No. 273).

Judiciary Law§ 487 provides: “An attorney or counselor who … [i]s guilty of any deceit
… with intent to deceive … any party … or … wilfully receives any money or allowance
for or on account of any money which he has not laid out … forfeits to the party injured
treble damages, to be recovered in a civil action.””Under Judiciary Law§ 487 (1), an attorney who is guilty of any deceit … with intent to deceive … any party … may be liable to the injured party for treble damages in a civil action” (Altman v Orseck, 235 AD3d 818, 819 [2d Dept 2025] [quotations and brackets omitted]).
“Treble damages awarded under Judiciary Law§ 487 are not designed to compensate a
plaintiff for injury to property or pecuniary interests. They are designed to punish
attorneys who violate the statute and to deter them from betraying their special obligation to protect the integrity of the courts and foster their truth-seeking function” (Specialized Indus. Servs. Corp. v Carter, 99 AD3d 692,693 [2d Dept 2012] [citations and quotations omitted]).
Judiciary Law§ 487 encompasses a claim by a client against a lawyer for “charging her
unnecessary and excessive fees” (Lauder v Goldhamer, 122 AD3d 908, 910 [2d Dept
2014] [affirming denial of dismissal of Judiciary Law§ 487 claim as “not duplicative of
the cause of action to recover damages for legal malpractice”]). An attorney’s deceptive
conduct causing a litigant to incur false or unnecessary attorneys’ fees falls within the
ambit of the statute:

Joseph v Fensterman, 204 AD3d 766, 767 [2d Dept 2022] [“Here, the first cause
of action adequately pleaded a claim to recover damages for violations of Judiciary
Law§ 487, as it alleged that the defendants Abrams, Fensterman … intentionally

Garanin v Hiatt, 219 AD3d 958, 959 [2d Dept 2023] [a litigant’s claim that an
attorney’s conduct “caused him” to incur unnecessary “attorneys’ fees” is
actionable under Judiciary Law§ 487];

nterfered with the settlement of the New Franklin litigation, causing years of
additional litigation, in order to generate legal fees in the amount of $1.7 million”];

• Betz v Blatt, 160 AD3d 696, 699 [2d Dept 2018] [“A party’s legal expenses in
  defending the lawsuit may be treated as the proximate result of the
  misrepresentation” covered by Judiciary Law§ 487 ]).
  Applying these authorities, Here, the record evidences that Maldonado and his Firm engaged in a pattern and practice of grossly excessive billing or outright fraudulent billing (i.e., billing for legal services Defendants either never provided, or which were provided entirely by other law firms) that resulted in the Sanders Entities paying $2,037,776.85 in legal fees to Defendants (Blaustein Aff., Ex. 2).
  For example, in the latter part of 2019 and in early 2020, Maldonado and the Firm
  devoted a great detail of time to Next Millennium Realty LLC, et al. v The Travelers
  Companies, Inc., et al., Supreme Court, Nassau County, Index No. 600996/2016 (the “Insurance Litigation Matter”), including responding to a request by the Special Referee for a catalog of all of the policies at issue (Blaustein Aff., ,i 20). Ultimately, Maldonado billed more than $86,ooo simply to review and scan insurance policies when he previously represented that a paralegal would be doing most of the work (Blaustein Aff., Ex. 3)
  In addition, from January 2018 through May 2019 in the Insurance Matter, Maldonado and the Firm’s bills refer extensively to the deposition of an expert witness named “Hughes.” (id., at at 3, 27, 35, 41,43, 62, 68, 73-75, 87, 142, 148, 160-161). For that single deposition, Maldonado and the Firm billed over 600 hours of time (id.). During that same period, Maldonado and the Firm billed approximately 316 hours of legal time for drafting an eight-page lawyer affirmation for a Daubert motion, an amount of time which is criminally disproportionate to the work product produced (id.).”

“All of the claims on which the Sanders Entities proceeded at this inquest, without
exception, arose from Maldonado and the Firm’s dishonesty, misrepresentation, and
deceit by rendering false and inflated legal bills in connection with underlying, pending
litigations, or from concealing the striking of an answer by another Justice of this Court
in one of the underlying litigations (see e.g. Matter of D’Angelo, 158 AD3d 107, 116 [2d
Dept 2017] [an attorney’s “self-dealing” is a “type of dishonesty” and “deceitful conduct”]; Matter of Myerson, 250 AD2d 41, 42 [1st Dept 1998] [“false billing … is, in and of itself, egregious conduct warranting severe penalty”]; Matter of Aaron, 232 AD2d 119, 124-25 2d Dept 1997] [ordering attorney “disbarred from the practice of law, effective immediately,” after he “inflated his legal fees and expenses by charging for work not actually performed”]).
Therefore, under Judiciary Law§ 487, the Court grants treble damages, as set forth below (see e.g. Suzuki v Greenberg, 220 AD3d 604, 604-05 [1st Dept 2023], lv denied 41 NY3d 908 [2024] [“the court properly awarded treble damages” because “affirmatively
misrepresenting . . . information” is “sufficient to establish egregious conduct under
Judiciary Law§ 487”] [quotations omitted]).”