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.
Judiciary Law § 487 is a favorite tool to use against attorneys. It is ancient and powerful. However, in Doscher v Meyer 2019 NY Slip Op 08171
Decided on November 13, 2019 Appellate Division, Second Department it was totally inapplicable.
“We agree with the Supreme Court’s determination granting those branches of the respective motions of…
May plaintiff sue the former attorney after settling the underlying case? It depends on whether plaintiff was effectively compelled to settle the underlying case or not. This differs from a situation where the underlying case is lost. How to tell whether the client was compelled or merely took the easy path? Glenwayne Dev. Corp v …
Legal malpractice issues, and definitely attorney-client privilege issues arise in Estates. They can come up prior to death, by virtue of the death or afterwards, but in each instance there is a question of the relationship of the estate and the attorney, and who is now the “client” in terms of rights and privileges between…
There is nothing new about the requirement that a defendant show both a reasonable excuse for the default as well as a meritorious defense to the action when seeking to vacate a default judgment. Neely v Felicetti
2019 NY Slip Op 08282 Decided on November 14, 2019 Appellate Division, First Department simply repeats this ancient…
Personal injury law is rife with violations of the Judiciary Law. Cases over the years have identified “runners” who go to accident sites and hospital ERs to get clients, payments of cash to clients, promises to “fund” the case and improper solicitations. Ginarte Gallardo Gonzalez & Winograd, LLP v Schwitzer 2019 NY Slip Op 33275(U) …
This multi-million dollar fraud led to convictions and a claim against Katten Muchin. Nevertheless, too much time has gone by and Katten is off the hook. Wimbledon Financing Master Fund, Ltd. v Hallac 2019 NY Slip Op 33281(U) November 4, 2019 Supreme Court, New York County
Docket Number: 652769/2018 Judge: Saliann Scarpulla discusses two interesting…
Many cases are lost, across the spectrum of legal issues, for procedural issues. It is especially poignant to see a legal malpractice case lost on service of process issues. Gengo v Storms 2019 NY Slip Op 02504 [171 AD3d 709] April 3, 2019 Appellate Division, Second Department presents such a situation.
“On October 23, 2016,…
Legal malpractice comes up in any number of underlying settings. In NYC real estate, zoning and building department violations are frequent contenders for legal action, hence frequent contenders in legal malpractice cases. Bakcheva v Law Offs. of Stein & Assoc. 2019 NY Slip Op 00844 [169 AD3d 624] February 6, 2019 Appellate Division, Second Department…
As we discussed on Friday, how and when “continuous representation” is applied depends more on the judge or appellate panel hearing the case than on time-honored well-understood rules. Schrull v Weis
2018 NY Slip Op 07769 [166 AD3d 829] November 14, 2018 Appellate Division, Second Department demonstrates that continuous representation may be applied idiosyncratically.
“On…
When does representation by an attorney end? Is it when there is friction between client and attorney? Is it when the attorney unilaterally withdraws? Is it when the attorney is granted a withdrawal by the Court? Courts are all over the place on this issue.
Courtney v McDonald 2019 NY Slip Op 07856 Decided on…
