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.
In New York there is case law which holds the attorney liabile for errors by a process server. Here is a similar case and analysis from Arizona
"Like most states, Arizona recognizes an exception to this rule, generally referred to as the "nondelegable duty exception." Id. "The policy reasons justifying such a departure are that…
An Apology rather than a law suit. This article reports that it works in medical malpractice. Would it work in legal malpractice?
"Since encouraging its doctors to apologize for errors, the University of Michigan Health System’s annual attorney fees have dropped by two-thirds, and malpractice suits and notices of intents to sue have fallen by…
Yesterday we reported on the Thomas Hyland letter in support of his firm’s position in the Wilson Elser Legal Malpractice case. Today, a bar association rejoinder. This second letter is not directed to the arguments that WEMED made, but to the entire concept of arguing the merits of a law suit in the letters to…
Geoffrey Tracktenberg reports this comma error which cost one side $1 Million in a legal malpractice case, which stemmed from a contract sentence. The story itself came from the NY TImes.
"The dispute is over this sentence: "This agreement shall be effective from the date it is made and shall continue in force for a…
The Wall Street Journal reports [subscription] that biglaw is a business, and is increasingly the target of legal malpractice suits. The report is supplemented with a Hinshaw attorney quote.
"Big law firms are mostly in the business of keeping others out of trouble, not themselves. But some practitioners who defend law firms are seeing an…
Moving from Bankruptcy court to Federal District Court, the law firm again loses:
"Firm’s Bad Faith Leaves Bad Taste of $877,000 Malpractice Tab
New York Lawyer
April 10, 2007
Reprints & Permissions
By Leigh Jones
The National Law Journal
A Minnesota federal court has found Dorsey & Whitney liable for more than $877,000 for legal…
Zenith Ins. Co. v. Cozen O’Connor, Case No. B184684 (Cal. Ct. App., March 21, 2007).
"The issue presented in this case relates to the nature and extent of the duty, if any, owed to the reinsurer by counsel retained by the ceding insurer to protect the interests of the insured under the underlying policy.
This article from columnists Norman Arnoff and Sue Jacobs [subscription] warns us to protect legal malpractice coverage by carefully answering the application questions.
"Every year someone in each law firm has the task of completing the application for the Lawyers’ Professional Liability Policy commonly called the Malpractice Policy. The policy is "claims-made" so that claims…
The Wall Street Journal reports:
"Charter Communications filed a lawsuit Friday against Irell & Manella, accusing the prominent Los Angeles firm of “critical errors” in completing a 1999 cable TV acquisition. The lawsuit alleges, among other claims, legal malpractice and requests damages of $150 million. Here’s the 31-page complaint and a story from Saturday’s…
Aquino v Kuczinski, Vila & Assoc., P.C.
2007 NY Slip Op 02801
Decided on April 3, 2007
Appellate Division, First Department
Here is a legal malpractice case arising from defendant’s failure to bring a slip and fall case within the statute of limitations. Legal Mal case lost becasue attorneys did not produce evidence that plaintiff…
