We’ve discussed the oft-found fact situation of how a fee determination by a bankruptcy court may block a later legal malpractice action.  In Breslin Realty Dev. Corp. v Shaw ;  2010 NY Slip Op 00087 Decided on January 5, 2010; Appellate Division, Second Department; Chambers, J., J.  the court writes persuasively about the concept:
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Criminal defendants have a well known and exacting path.  Arrest, Indictment, Trial, Appeal, CPL 440 Motion (or its federal equivalent) habeas proceedings, and finally, they often turn to a legal malpractice action.  In New York there is a strict prohibition against suing ones criminal defense attorney.  Its sort of a quasi-immune situation.  "New York law also…

Continuing the trend towards a combination of bankruptcy and legal malpractice, we note that bankruptcy follows, and rarely precedes legal malpractice situations, hence, we expect a swell of the intersection following the financial down-trends of the past year.  Here, Tabner v Drake
2009 NY Slip Op 10006; Decided on December 31, 2009 ; Appellate Division, Third…

Plaintiff suffers a construction accident, and his attorneys wait too long to bring the action.  He had a Labor Law 200.240, 241 and other claims, typical in a gravity-fall construction case.  His attorney admit that they waited too long to commence the action, but was successful in dismissal of the Labor la 200 and 240…

In today’s NYLJ, Abraham B. Krieger writes a compelling article about "negligent referral ", and gives some history and out of state cases, along with a discussion of NY cases in the area.  To backtrack, Mr. Krieger writes: "Recently, New York’s Appellate Divisions in the First, Second and Third departments, and a number of other…

In Dischiavi v Calli ;2009 NY Slip Op 09773 ;Decided on December 30, 2009 ;Appellate Division, Fourth Department  we see a discussion of the effects of a bankruptcy filing on a legal malpractice claim.  While the governing principal applies to any cause of action which a plaintiff had when bankruptcy was filed. it seems…

"The Cobbler’s Son had no shoes…" is an ancient way of saying that people attend to the needs of others, including clients, while ignoring the requirements closer to home.  While the decision does not make this analogy, nor does it explicitly hinge the reasoning on the lack of an affidavit of plaintiff, we wonder whether…

Today’s NYLJ article by Daniel Wise chronicles the chilling story of an attorney who put his own freedom at risk in order to stymie a former client, and a successor attorney.  Why, and the clumsy method undertaken is the mystery.  in In re: RUBY G. EMANUEL, Debtor.;Chapter 7, Case No. 97-44969 (SMB); UNITED…