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.
David A. Kaminsky & Assoc., PC v Brenner 2019 NY Slip Op 51028(U) Decided on June 24, 2019 Appellate Term, First Department presents an unusual situation. The Appellate Term recognizes that there is a viable legal malpractice claim, but allows summary judgment on fees to be affirmed.
“We sustain the grant of plaintiff’s motion for…
Legal malpractice is fascinating, in part, because of the wide range of underlying disputes in which it pops up. Take for example the Manhattan apartment purchaser. She wants city views. She buys into an new development, and does so will prior to completion of the building. What exactly are city views? In this case her…
Expert disclosure in New York is truely a black hole. The statute does not require much by way of naming the expert. You have to give the name and a little bit about what the expert will say. However, the timing is completely up to court discretion. Here is what one plaintiff did in a…
Too speculative is a defense commonly utilized by defendants in legal malpractice settings. Here, in Birch v Novick & Assoc., P.C.
2019 NY Slip Op 31712(U) June 14, 2019 Supreme Court, New York County Docket Number: 161445/13, Justice Carol R. Edmead discusses just how speculative they might be.
“Defendants argue that the complaint must be…
We have argued that legal malpractice cases are disproportionately subject to early dismissal. Our theory is that Courts have an inherent and innate bias in favor of attorneys. There is a plethora of academic and real world experience to support this thesis. Anecdotally, Baugher v Cullen & Dykman, LLP 2019 NY Slip Op 04904 Decided…
A motion in limine is an advisory pre-trial evidentiary ruling. A motion for summary judgment is a dispositive motion which seeks to limit a claim or a recovery. In Mazzurco v Gordon 2019 NY Slip Op 04931 Decided on June 19, 2019 Appellate Division, Second Department the motion in limine succeeded.
“In this action to…
The question of statute of limitations in a professional negligence setting is little different from that the same issue in a legal malpractice setting. CPLR 214(6) is the applicable statute in both and both have the concept of continuing representation. Board of Mgrs. of 141 Fifth Ave. Condominium v 141 Acquisition Assoc. LLC 2019…
As proof that Judiciary Law § 487 has entered the mainstream, and will likely be snapchatted soon, take a look at Delbaun v Self Represented Kevin McKeown May 30, 2019 Supreme Court, New York County Docket Number: 157986/2018 Judge: Andrew Borrok. First, the names. Is the caption not a tip off that this is…
Owner A performs work in a NYC building. Owner B is damaged. Owner B sues Owner A as well as the building. Lots of attorney fees are generated. Owner B then sues the attorneys for the Board for legal malpractice. Standing? No. Derivative claim on behalf of the Board. No. Second chance? Yes.
“This action…
The Appellate Division gave explicit advice, not often heard, on how to deal with an Order to Show Cause which a judge declines to sign. In the end, everyone seems to have done it wrong. In Cypress Hills Mgt., Inc. v Lempenski 2019 NY Slip Op 04677 Decided on June 12, 2019
Appellate Division,…
