Truebright Co., Ltd. v Lester ; 2011 NY Slip Op 04235 ; ;Appellate Division, Second Department is yet another example of a lost legal malpractice case, but not based upon the innocence or non-departure of the attorney. In fact, just as in a recent case dismissed because the statute of limitations had passed on a
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.
Is This the Longest Case Ever?
Attorney fee disputes often blossom into legal malpractice cases, although Stephan B. Gleich & Assoc. v Gritsipis ; 2011 NY Slip Op 05483 ; Appellate Division, Second Department is not one of these. Nevertheless, it is one of the longest attorney fee disputes in memory. The case itself started in 1993 as the AD tells…
Are Courts Just Too Willing to Dismiss Legal Malpractice Cases?
Anecdotally, we believe that Courts have an institutional bias against legal malpractice cases. That said, we are the first to admit that no catalogue of dismissed cases has been produced. Still…Macaluso v Del Col , 2012 NY Slip Op 03605 Decided on May 8, 2012 Appellate Division, Second Department is an example. Here, defendants…
A Trip and Fall Legal Malpractice Case
Client trips and falls because of a defect in a parking lot. Client goes to attorney who fails to commence the case within the statute of limitations. Client sues attorney who comes up with very inventive defenses. What happens to the case on summary judgment?
in Duque v Perez 2012 NY Slip Op 03593  …
An Overly Generous Decision is Pruned Back, Plaintiff Still Loses in Legal Malpractice
Relentlessly applying analysis to the "but for" portion of a legal malpractice claim, the 2d Department modified a CPLR 3211 decision by Supreme Court. Here, it reversed dismissal under CPLR 3211(a)(1) yet the case remains dismissed under CPLR 3211(a)(7) because the client could not pay the mortgage.
in Cervini v Zanoni ; 2012 NY Slip…
Experts and Legal Malpractice Litigation
Experts are often needed in litigation, and always in medical malpractice litigation. Med Mal cases are lost and it is sometimes thought that they are lost because of experts. Was the expert good enough? Did the expert "give" the departures?
In Healy v Finz & Finz, P.C. 2011 NY Slip Op 01616 Appellate Division…
A Nazi and A Puzzlingly Vituperative Diatribe and Legal Malpractice
If the underlying transactions and relationships are confusing, try to figure out who did what in this legal malpractice case. Was Nahzi a borrower or a lender? Did anyone pay $ 90,000 for a $500,000 stake in a parking lot? Why is the accountant so angry? How come no one defended the motion to dismiss? …
An Appellate Slip and Legal Malpractice
In Aramarine Brokerage, Inc. v Hall, Estill, Hardwick, Gable, Golden & Nelson, P.C. 2012 NY Slip Op 03533 Decided on May 3, 2012 Appellate Division, First Department the question of whether appellate counsel’s failure to argue that the basis for his client’s loss in District Court was an impermissible argument raised only in reply…
Legal Malpractice Case Dismissed on the “But For” Principle
Plaintiff is injured in a motor vehicle accident at an intersection with an inoperative traffic light. His attorney failed to commence the action within the statute of limitations. Legal malpractice case is started and proceeds through summary judgment. Supreme Court denies summary judgment to defendants who appeals.
Three-Headed Attack Falls Short in Legal Malpractice
We have come to believe that an artificially large number of legal malpractice cases are dismissed at the pleading stage, generally in an early "but for" analysis by the Court. Courts (in our anecdotal opinion) delve far further into the underlying case in legal malpractice litigation than they do elsewhere. Granted, legal malpractice is unique…