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.
Wright v Kok-Min Kyan 2017 NY Slip Op 32057(U) September 28, 2017 Supreme Court, New York County Docket Number: 805475/2016 Judge: Eileen A. Rakower is a medical malpractice case that explains what to do when service of the summons and complaint has gone awry.
“Plaintiffs served the Summons with Notice upon Lenox Hill Hospital by…
This is a sordid story of an attorney gone wrong, seriously wrong. Whether getting precluded while handling a legal malpractice case was the straw or not, a wake of devastation has been left in his wake.
Matter of Pierre 2017 NY Slip Op 06999 Decided on October 5, 2017 Appellate Division, First Department Per Curiam…
It looks like Plaintiff came to dislike Supreme Court, New York County. It wanted out, even after the Court dismissed on summary judgment, without prejudice. They had the chance to re-file there, but instead took the case to Westchester County. Forum shopping? We don’t know. But EB Brands Holdings, Inc. v McGladrey, LLP 2017…
Attorney fees are the driver of what could be a majority of legal malpractice cases. CLE lecturers consistently warn of the attorney fee-legal malpractice reflex arc, and with good reason. Glassman v Weinberg 2017 NY Slip Op 06885 Decided on October 3, 2017 Appellate Division, First Department is a prime example. Here the account stated…
In the world of big lending, a simple omission can cause large damages. So it went in Scopia Windmill LP v Olshan Frome Wolosky LLP 2017 NY Slip Op 32031(U) September 26, 2017
Supreme Court, New York County Docket Number: 650616/2016 Judge: Saliann Scarpulla. Plaintiffs were investing in agriculture in order to get into the…
Privity between client and attorney is mirrored by the doctrine of the lack of a doctor-patient relationship. Forget that there was a failure to diagnose breast cancer, and that the result can be deadly. Social policy of limiting suits between patients and remote medical providers as well as the social policy of limiting legal malpractice…
In one of the more confusing fact recitations we have come across, where Plaintiff in action 1 is Defendant in action 2 and where both parties are female, pronouns and party-designation does not help. Whatever. In Verkowitz v Ursprung 2017 NY Slip Op 06675 Decided on September 27, 2017 Appellate Division, Second Department the attorney…
Defendant attorney in Baram v Person 2017 NY Slip Op 06625 Decided on September 26, 2017
Appellate Division, First Department tried to spread the blame in two ways, each of which failed. A third-party action was wholly wiped out. His arguments that papers were insufficient similarly failed.
“Plaintiffs alleged in their complaint that defendant attorney…
In an otherwise run-of-the-mill contract case between an IT provider and a bank, Justice Kornreich illustrates a couple of interesting principles. The first is that IT providers do not rise to the level of professional engineers for the purpose of allowing tort litigation against them. The second is the “economic loss doctrine.”
In this legal malpractice case, the attorney has the right to represent himself. Question: How does insurance filter into this? In Herczl v Feinsilver 2017 NY Slip Op 06528 Decided on September 20, 2017 Appellate Division, Second Department
“In 2010, the defendant David Feinsilver, an attorney, commenced representing the plaintiff in a legal matter unrelated…
