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.
We again look at Trapp-White v Fountain 2015 NY Slip Op 31835(U) September 30, 2015
Supreme Court, New York County Docket Number: 150719/2015 Judge: Donna M. Mills.
“Plaintiff is a native of Belize, residing in Suffolk County, New York. She entered the United States illegally in 1986, and soon thereafter the Immigration and Naturalization Service…
Trapp-White v Fountain 2015 NY Slip Op 31835(U) September 30, 2015 Supreme Court, New York County Docket Number: 150719/2015 Judge: Donna M. Mills is an unusual decision in the immigration – legal malpractice filed. First, there are a number of interesting details that come from ICE and support plaintiff’s case, details which are rarely in…
More and more cases are resolved by summary judgment; the number of trials has plummeted over the past 15 years. Practitioners have always given strong consideration to summary judgment motions, and must consider all arguments that can be made. Here, in Pedote v Kelly January 28, 2015 2015 NY Slip Op 00737 [124 AD3d 855] …
Of all the fields of law, matrimonial law ranks high in the consumer dissatisfaction index. There are often disparities of income which leads to disparity of representation of the less-monied spouse. A frequent complaint about matrimonial attorneys concerns the ease with which they enter and leave cases, often on the eve of trial. Clients often…
The statute of limitations for professional malpractice (other than medical malpractice) is three years. What happens when further claims are added to a timely case, and defendants argue that these claims are time-barred? Hustedt Chevrolet, Inc. v Jones, Little & Co. 2015 NY Slip Op 04611 [129 AD3d 669] June 3, 2015 Appellate Division, Second…
In the distant past, breach of contract cases against attorneys carried a 6 year statute of limitations, but that all ended long ago. A claim of fraud is also due a 6 year statute of limitations and may be rewarded by treble damages. Clients often ask whether a claim can be made against the attorney…
Today’s New York Law Journal has an interesting article which discusses the Pre- and Post-Amalfitano v. Rosenberg status of Judiciary Law § 487 cases. The conclusion of Herrington and Miller is that JL § 487 cases are on the rise, and courts are less willing to dismiss them at the beginning of the case. …
Only clients may sue their attorney in legal malpractice. It really does not matter (so much) whether the attorney made a mistake that hurt you. What matters is whether you (and that means you, not your father) hired the attorney. So, beneficiaries to estates that don’t get what they should can rarely sue the attorney…
Kerley v Kerley 2015 NY Slip Op 06891 Decided on September 23, 2015 Appellate Division, Second Department is a tragic story. What the Court portrays as a good mom, and a troubled dad ends in divorce and financial ruin. Father blew through $1 Million and was in drug rehab, was a gambler and when it…
The least understood part of legal malpractice litigation is the “but for” standard, in which Plaintiff must demonstrate that “but for” the negligence (or departure) of the attorney, plaintiff would have enjoyed a better or more economically favorable outcome. In most instances plaintiff correctly recognizes the departure, and the damages are often self-evident. This is…
