Almost as popular as attorney fee cases are defenses of legal malpractice.  Here, in Sieratzki v Sei Global, Inc., NY Slip Op 32656(u), all the basics are laid out.  Attorney represents client for a longish period of time, and substitutes into an Arbitration entitled  HL Group Partners, LLC v. Sei Global, Inc  He worked on the case…

It does not happen often, but non-lawyers sometimes come to represent clients.  An impostor?  A simple clerical mistake?  We don’t know how it happened in this case, but in Natural Organics Inc. v Anderson Kill & Olick, P.C. ;2009 NY Slip Op 08472 ;Decided on November 17, 2009 ;Appellate Division, First Department "Plaintiff…

Monique Pillard, president of Elite Models, is the plaintiff in this legal malpractice case,  She was a defendant in a highly significant employment discrimination case revolving around an asthmatic worker who was fired, and the harassment and smoking that took place all around her.

in Pillard v. Goodman, Supreme Court, New York County…

There are some basic rules in legal malpractice litigation about fees.  One of these rules is that an attorney may be terminated at any time by the client, either for cause or without cause.  A corollary rule is that when an attorney is terminated for cause, he is due no compensation. 

That’s a pretty stark rule, and…

New York traveled through a sea change in its attorney disciplinary and ethical rules when the new rules were enacted in April.  Prior to the change, DR 2-107 did not require that a client be notified of the "percentage split" of fees between multiple attorneys working on a case; only the fact of multiple attorneys…

Legal malpractice plaintiffs who are suing for representation in a divorce action are routinely placed between a rock and a hard place, when asked at the settlement of their divorce action whether they are satisfied with attorney’s representation.  They are told to say ‘yes" and often do, simply to end the torture.  This simple "yes"…

Corporate clients assign causes of action between themselves on a fairly regular basis.  Often, for purely economic reasons, in mergers, and in other corporate maneuverings, a cause of action will become one of many assets to be exchanged.  Here, in NEW FALLS CORP.,  v. EDWARD N. LERNER,No. 08-4991-cv;UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR…

Yesterday we discussed medical treatment liens and when an attorney might become liable to pay them, even though the attorney did not deduct from the settlement proceeds when making the distribution.

Today, Joel Stashenko in the NYLJ reports passage of a bill to eliminate "double dipping" by public employees in the disability area.  Specifically, "The…