Estate brings action against its attorneys, who successfully move to dismiss in Surrogate’s Court on the basis that the action was not "brought during the administration of an estate." Does this doom the legal malpractice and overbilling suit? Is an overbilling suit duplicitive of the legal malpractice claims. The answer is "no" in both instances.
Andrew Lavoott Bluestone
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.
Mismanaged Litigation and the Loss of a 6-Family Building
As is true of many other things, this story started with mismanaged money. The original problem was exacerbated by mismanaged litigation. in Gordon v Barrett 2014 NY Slip Op 51431(U)
Decided on September 30, 2014 Supreme Court, Kings County Schmidt, J. plaintiff originally had money problems.
"Plaintiff Gloria Gordon (plaintiff [FN1] ) maintains that…
Buck Rogers and An Account Stated
Privity, schmivity. The Appellate Division recently decided this legal malpractice case arising out of the intellectual property case involving the comic Buck Rogers. Does it matter whether the Trust actually hired the law firm? No. The Trust is liable anyway. Can the Trust sue for legal malpractice? No. The claims are too speculative.
Continuous Representation Despite Bumps and Gaps
Town of Amherst hires attorneys to represent them in the termination of an employee. Time goes by Things go wrong. Attorneys are hired again (rehired?) to continue to represent the Town. Time goes by. Attorneys are once again hired. When the case is finally lost, the Town sues the attorneys. Continuous representation?
An Upstate Legal Malpractice Case Returns Upsate
A case arising in Erie County concerning activities in Syracuse, and all about a couple of law firms from Buffalo is being broken up and returned to Buffalo even after the New York County Commercial Division accepted the case.
Fidelity Natl. Tit. Ins. Co. v Altshuler Shaham Provident Funds Ltd. 2014 NY Slip Op…
More On A Med-Mal-Legal-Mal Case
Gajek v Schwartzapfel, Novick, Truowski & Marcus, P.C. 2014 NY Slip Op 32418(U) September 8, 2014 Supreme Court, Suffolk County Docket Number: 12-2375 Judge: Ralph T. Gazzillo is an example of what we believe is the most complicated case to litigate. Last week we discussed the successor counsel problem. Today, we look to this…
$100 Million in Personal Guarantees and a Bad Result
Did Plaintiff paint himself into a corner, when he expanded a business and took on $100 million in personal guarantees, or did his attorneys fail him later, when litigation began? That’s the question in Lichtenstein v Willkie Farr & Gallagher LLP 2014 NY Slip Op 06242 Decided on September 18, 2014 Appellate Division, First Department.…
Many Technical Reasons for An Outlier Decision
It’s well understood that non-pecuniary damages are not available in legal malpractice. No damages for emotional distress, no damages for physical injury (think: heart attack) from legal malpractice and no damages for wrongful incarceration which are non-pecuniary. Nevertheless, in D’Alessandro v Carro 2014 NY Slip Op 06246 Decided on September 18, 2014 Appellate Division, First…
What Does it Take to Succeed on Summary Judgment in Legal Malpractice?
Gajek v Schwartzapfel, Novick, Truowski & Marcus, P.C. 2014 NY Slip Op 32418(U) September 8, 2014 Supreme Court, Suffolk County Docket Number: 12-2375 Judge: Ralph T. Gazzillo discusses the burden for both plaintiff and defendant.
For Defendant: Schwartzapfel and Platt now move for summary judgment dismissing the complaint and all cross claims against Platt.
The Intersection of Medical Malpractice and Legal Malpractice
A legal malpractice case which arises from a medical malpractice case gone wrong is (we believe) just about the most complicated case to litigate. Plaintiff must first prove that there were departures from good legal representation, and then afterwards, must prove that there were departures from medical treatment which proximately caused damage. Both legal and…