Pecan cracking is big business, and this patent legal malpractice, which just recently ended in a $5.8 million verdict demonstrates the reach of legal advice and its potential liability. In Columbia, SC Frank Robertson was awarded $5.5 Million for bad legal advice, which he received from Nexsen, Pruet, Adams, Kleemeier. For the details.
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.
Legal Malpractice Bar hopes this is not a trend
Rock, paper, scissors – read Cassandra Crotty’s blog on this new ADR which is sweeping the courts. Details
$178 Million Sidley Austin-KPMG Settlement Nears
“A $178 million settlement in a class action against accounting firm KPMG and law firm Sidley Austin Brown & Wood, for allegedly selling fraudulent tax shelter strategies, won final approval Friday.” Details
Medical Malpractice and Legal Malpractice Parallels
Legal malpractice is the decendent of medical malpractice. This lineage is demonstrated in continued representation, in analysis of “standards” of care, and in many other fashions.
A very interesting article appears today in the NYLJ by Thomas A. Moore and Matthew Gaier discusses Hinlicky v. Dreyfus _NY3d_, reported in the NYLJ on 5/3/06.
This Court…
Tolling of Statute in California
California has very different rules from New York on statute of limitations questions. Here is a case from California where plaintiff retained defendant attorney to represent her in a discrimination case. He had two paths to take, and after exhausting one, simply ended the work. Several years later, after the statute had run on legal…
Vinson & Elkins settles Enron Legal Malpractice
Vinson & Elkins settled one part of the Enron Legal Malpractice case, this one in bankruptcy court for $30 million. In addition it will lose $3.9 million in fees. Still to come: the investor’s lawsuit which could come to billions Details.
Prince Albert II, Monaco and Legal Malpractice
We rarely go outside of the continental US for Legal Malpractice news, but this is a hybrid. Prince Albert II of Monaco recently admitted paternity in a California case. His teenage daughter there in California cannot ascend to the throne, but is due part of the billions. I don’t remember, but isn’t her grandmother Grace…
Beldock, Levine & Hoffman, Adding Defendants and Legal Malpractice
Just trying to read through Judge Cote’s decision in Trepel v. Dippold, published in today’s NYJL reminds me of law school. Here’s what I get out of it. Trepel is suing the law firm because he thinks they helped one Diop to get paintings out of the district before Trepel could execute upon them…
Cigarettes, Asbestos, Sullivan & Cromwell and Legal Malpractice?
Matthew Hirsche of the NYLJ writes about the interconnection of a missing $500 million dollars, Flintkote Co., Imperial Tobacco Co of Canada, and the eventual collapse of the asbestos company. Plaintiff’s attorneys are now trying to determine whether Sullivan & Cromwell helped in diverting $500 million away from potential tobacco and asbestos plaintiffs. Details…
Legal Malpractice cases fails, so he steals Diamonds
Legal malpractice cases often feel like the last resort. The original case has failed, and the legal malpractice case is plaintiff’s last resort. This, however, is ridiculous. Details.