Melcher v Greenberg Traurig, LLP 2013 NY Slip Op 00256 Decided on January 17, 2013
Appellate Division, First Department is extraordinary. It’s special for the facts, and for two holdings and the re-statement of a much overlooked principal all seriously affecting calculation of the statute of limitations. Now settled is the correct S/L statute for Judiciary Law 487, and whether there
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.
The Court Giveth and the Appellate Division Taketh
In the past several years we’ve been given unprecedented access to court records. No more is it necessary to travel to the courthouse to review a file, nor must we wait for the clerk to mail (or not mail) a decision. However, access to written decisions is not universal. in Bullfrog, LLC v Nolan
2013…
A Short Primer on Bankruptcy and Capacity to Sue
Plaintiffs in legal malpractice suits are often in financial distress, and bankruptcy filings loom. When a petition in bankruptcy is filed, significant changes to the debtors’ estate may take place. There are differences when the filing takes place, and each of the three major chapters have different results, whether Chapter 7,11 or 13. Here, in…
How to Lose a Charging Lien
Attorneys automatically obtain a charging lien by commencing an action. There are several ways to lose that lien. One is to be terminated "for cause" and another is to withdraw voluntarily. This is different from being "consented out" or by withdrawing with mutual consent. In Nassour v Lutheran Med. Ctr. ;2010 NY Slip Op…
A Primer on All Aspects of Legal Malpractice
For a well written decision on one of the most complicated factual settings we can remember, read Oikonomos, Inc. v Bahrenberg 2013 NY Slip Op 50017(U) Decided on January 5, 2013 Supreme Court, Suffolk County Pines, J. This legal malpractice-breach of fiduciary duty-breach of contract-fraud-promissory estoppel- equitable estoppel case has even more to it. The…
Morally Corrupt and Intellectually Bankrupt Attorney Will Legal Malpractice Follow?
We were unable to select the best of Gerard M. Tanella’s transgressions, and invite you to read the entire list prepared by the Appellate Division in Matter of Tanella 2013 NY Slip Op 00099
Decided on January 9, 2013 Appellate Division, Second Department Per Curiam. which determined his "complete abdication by the respondent of…
What Plaintiff Knew and How it Kills a Legal Malpractice Case
Battling over the "but for" portion of the legal malpractice requirements is generally where commercial cases such as Garten v Shearman & Sterling LLP 2013 NY Slip Op 00035
Decided on January 8, 2013 Appellate Division, First Department end up. Here, in a surprisingly clear recitation, the AD tells us why this case was doomed.…
Bankruptcy, Statutes of Limitation and Legal Malpractice
Plaintiff is injured on a cruise ship, and comes back to NY looking for an attorney. Right now we should be thinking, venue, long-arm jurisdiction, state or federal court. However, in Palmer v Mulvehill 2012 NY Slip Op 33046(U) December 19, 2012 Sup Ct, Suffolk County Docket Number: 11-17748 Judge: Daniel Martin things take off…
Most of the Thicket Cleared Away in a Legal Malpractice Case
In this legal malpractice case, many of the causes of action are now weeded out after CPLR 3211 motions. H.P.S. Mgt. Co., Inc. v St. Paul Surplus Lines Ins. Co. 2012 NY Slip Op 09028
Decided on December 26, 2012 Appellate Division, Second Department
"In an action, inter alia, to recover damages for…
Several Errors Doom this Legal Malpractice Counterclaim
A very familiar scenario in the legal malpractice world is the Attorney Fee Suit / Legal Malpractice Counterclaim. Facially, this combo is completely predictable and logically there is no shame or second-class status to the legal malpractice counterclaim. In practice, however, many courts think the counterclaim is a "last-ditch" or equivalent effort to avoid paying justified fees. …