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.
"Turnabout is fair play" This childhood aphorism describes the third-party practice in a newly reported case, 601 Realty Corp. v. Conway Farrell, Curtin & Kelly PC, NY Slip Op. 33076, from Supreme Court, Nassau County. The case arises from a lead paint case, and features Conway Farrell’s attempt to third-party plaintiff”s personal attorney which fails.
During the…
Criminal Law practitioners enjoy a blanket immunity for legal malpractice not permitted to any other field of law. Briefly put, a convicted criminal defendant may not successfully sue his attorney unless he can demonstrate innocence or later exoneration.
Here is a case of an individual who pled to a counterfeiting [presumably handbags, ect, and not…
Demonstrating the ancient rubric, "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" the case of Rosenstrauss v Women’s Imaging Ctr. of Orange County ;2008 NY Slip Op 08473 ; Decided on November 5, 2008 Appellate Division, Second Department shows us how a procedural issue forces plaintiff to espouse the defense of the legal malpractice defendant…
There is no lack of irony in legal malpractice litigation. Because of the structure of the "case within a case" defendant attorney often takes on the defenses available in the underlying case. So, plaintiff’s attorney sees defendant attorney loudly and heatedly making the very same arguments that were made in the underlying action with absolutely…
Whether attorney for Plaintiff or for defendant, each practitioner in the Legal Malpractice field has either a professional or personal interest in legal malpractice insurance. No one, whether prosecuting or defending legal malpractice cases wants to lose or have coverage excluded, and attorneys do not want to have coverage lost for the defendants in a…
Worker is injured on the job by a paving machine. Worker collects WC benefits from his employment. Worker sues paving machine manufacturer in products liability, and his attorney blows the statute. Worker succeeds in legal malpractice. May WC carrier recoup benefits?
Had the case been tried as a products liability case [not legal malpractice] in…
Plaintiff sued his former criminal defense attorney because the attorney did not perfect an appeal. So far, so good. What followed shows how difficult litigation can be, and in how many ways a good case can go awry. Consider, for example, whether there could be a legal malpractice case against the attorney. The answer is probably…
Judges retire or don’t stand for re-election, and then look for a new job. That’s expected and no one is surprised when they surface as a partner in biglaw, or in a prestigious local firm. This story borders on the extreme.Charles Toutant of the New Jersey Law Journal reports:
"Lawyers who engaged a retiring…
Yesterday we examined this case: Whalen v DeGraff, Foy, Conway, Holt-Harris & Mealey ,2008 NY Slip Op 06342 [53 AD3d 912] ,July 17, 2008 ,Appellate Division, Third Department on the issue of when an expert is necessary. Today, we look at how a referring attorney, [or a supervising attorney] may become responsible for the…
The short answer to the question of when an expert is necessary in legal malpractice is "most of the time." Here in this case, Whalen v DeGraff, Foy, Conway, Holt-Harris & Mealey ,2008 NY Slip Op 06342 [53 AD3d 912] ,July 17, 2008 ,Appellate Division, Third Department we see the slightly longer answer…
