"A tenant who lost her suit against the owners and managers of the apartment complex at which she was raped has a viable malpractice claim against the lawyers who represented her in the matter, the Fourth District Court of Appeal ruled yesterday.

After initially meeting with Kelegian, she saw him only on one other occasion, her deposition, she claimed. When she showed up to court for trial as instructed in a letter from Kelegian, the lawyer never arrived and left her to wait for three hours before she finally learned her case had been dismissed.

The lawyers moved for summary judgment, claiming that Ambriz could not have established Casa Escondida owed her a duty to better secure the premises from intruders in any event, and thus they could not be liable for malpractice.

Stern agreed, finding Ambriz did not proffer sufficient evidence to create a triable issue as to whether the complex’s failure to properly maintain its doors and locks was a substantial fact in causing her injury.

But Justice Aaron, writing for the court, said:

“In view of the repeated security breaches and the known presence of unauthorized male intruders, a violent attack by an intruder was sufficiently foreseeable that Casa Escondida had a minimal duty to properly maintain the locks on the doors and gates to the complex and its buildings.”

The case is Ambriz v. Kelegian, D046453. "

Strange $54 Million Fee-Split Saga Haunts Thelen

"Secrets, lies and betrayal are the heart of any good story.

Add an itinerant Frenchman with dark secrets and a powerful American law firm — first fighting together to expose millions of dollars in fraud, now locked in bitter battle of money and ethics themselves — and you’ve got an epic.

The long-running saga began with allegations of French banks secretively, and illegally, buying a California insurer. It has devolved into a battle over millions of dollars because of shifting — and questionable — fee-splitting deals between Thelen Reid Brown Raysman & Steiner and the informant it once represented.

Last February, Francois Marland, the French lawyer and holder of secrets, demanded arbitration over the fee-sharing deal. Thelen, represented by top-flight litigators at Keker & Van Nest, has responded with a lawsuit to cut him off. The showdown trial is scheduled for this summer in the Northern District of California.

At issue is $54 million that the law firm (then Thelen Reid & Priest) was paid for its work in a case that wrought a $715 million payout from a consortium of French bankers in 2005. The fee-sharing agreement in the dispute has raised the hackles of legal ethicists, who say some provisions skate dangerously close to buying Marland’s testimony.

According to filings made in Thelen’s suit, Marland has been paid $19 million of Thelen’s fees. Still, he accuses Thelen of betraying him with another client and putting the firm’s interests ahead of his. He’s looking for $35 million or a greater cut of the contingency fee.

Thelen’s suit claims it doesn’t owe him anything else and wants the court to uphold the latest draft of Marland’s fee agreement "

Daniel. Sheehan recently earned selection to the Lawdragon 500 Leading Plaintiffs’ Lawyers in America list.

"In addition to his dual Lawdragon honors, Mr. Sheehan has been named a Texas Super Lawyer in Texas Monthly magazine each of the past four years. Super Lawyers are selected by their peers and represent the top 5% of attorneys in Texas. His many awards are supported by his achievements in the courtroom. Mr. Sheehan has obtained more than a dozen seven-figure verdicts in business litigation. In the past five years alone, he has collected more than $23 million for clients in seven major legal malpractice cases.

Mr. Sheehan is Board Certified in Civil Trial Law by the Texas Board of Legal Specialization. He regularly handles trials and appeals in state and federal courts, including cases before the Supreme Court of Texas and the U.S. Supreme Court.  $ 23 Million! 

Disbarred attorney "Bubba" Haupt has caused another attorney to be suspended. "Richmond Hill attorney Murl "Gene" Geary has been suspended from practice for a year for mishandling a case with disbarred lawyer Reginald "Bubba" Haupt. :  The underlying case was a legal malpractice.  Here is the Savannah Morning News article.

The New York Post reports that Anonymous Judge threatened well known attorney Ravi Batra for bringing a legal malpractice case against an attorney who later became a judge. 

Anonymous Judge threatend "that he would never win another motion or case in Manhattan again because of his lawsuit against now-Judge George Silver.   Batra made the accusation in a motion to move his case to Staten Island.

His malpractice suit was filed on behalf of a woman named Margherita Merola, who’s suing Silver and his former law partner, Steve Santo. She accused them of fumbling a lawsuit and then trying to cover it up with faked court documents. "

The NY Times reports that Mr. Batra is well known to judges in NY and has on ocassion defended them.  

Who is Anonymous Judge????   The NY Post article identifies Anonymous Judge as a "her."    The case is assigned to Justice Braun, indisputably a male.  Who is Anonymous Judge?

Here is the legal malpractice case from the biggest verdicts in Kansas of last year.

"•$3 million in a breach of fiduciary duty and legal malpractice claim against Sanford Krigel and Krigel & Krigel.

The plaintiff alleged she hired the defendants after she decided to give up her baby for adoption. The defendants also represented the adopting couple. After the plaintiff gave birth, she decided to keep the baby, but the adoption went ahead. Krigel claimed that he referred the plaintiff to another attorney and did not work for her. Other lawyers involved in the case settled before trial for undisclosed amounts. "

Here is a decision from Justice Diamond in New York County, dismissing a legal malpractice case on collateral estoppel.  Tydings v, Greenfield, Stein & Senior LLP.  The case is reported in today’s NYLJ [subscription].

"It is ordered that: This is a legal malpractice action. Plaintiff Frieda Tydings is a former trustee of an irrevocable inter vivos trust created in 1993 by and for the benefit of an individual named Ricki Singer. On January 1, 1997, plaintiff resigned as trustee and was replaced by a successor. On August 21, 2003, Singer commenced a proceeding in the Surrogate’s Court, New York County, in which she sought a compulsory accounting from both plaintiff and the successor trustee. Plaintiff retained the defendant law firm, Greenfield, Stein & Senior, LLP, to represent her in the accounting action. Plaintiff claims that defendant never filed an answer or any other response to Singer’s petition for a compulsory accounting and that, as a result, on September 24, 2003, the Surrogate’s Court issued an order requiring her to provide an accounting. Thereafter, defendant withdrew as plaintiff’s counsel in the Surrogate’s Court proceeding and plaintiff filed a final accounting on November 14, 2004.

On November 16, 2005, Singer filed objections to plaintiff’s accounting and sought to charge plaintiff with respect to matters that occurred before her resignation as trustee in 1997. Plaintiff, through her new counsel, filed a motion to dismiss the objections, pursuant to CPLR 3211(a)(5), on the ground that the six-year statute of limitations for accounting actions had expired prior to the filing of Singer’s petition to compel an accounting. On January 27, 2006, the Surrogate’s Court (Renee Roth, J.) denied plaintiff’s motion on the grounds that (1) the accounting six-year statute of limitations had not yet expired by the filing date of the petition and (2) plaintiff waived the statute of limitations defense by failing to assert it in a timely manner. See In re Singer, 12 Misc3d 621, 624-26 (Surr’s Ct NY Co 2006). On appeal, the order was affirmed solely on the issue of waiver. See In re Singer, 30 AD3d 211 (1st Dept 2006). The First Department did not address the issue of whether the plaintiff’s statute of limitations defense would have been valid if it had been timely asserted. This legal malpractice action then followed. The defendant now moves to dismiss the complaint, pursuant to CPLR 3211 (a)(1), (5) and (7), on the grounds that the complaint fails to state a cause of action and/or is barred by collateral estoppel. "

"One of three lawyers accused of plundering Kentucky’s $200 million fen-phen settlement said he and his colleagues "tore up or burned" notes showing how much they paid themselves and their clients.

Depositions obtained by The Courier-Journal include Lexington attorney Melbourne Mills Jr.’s description of a meeting that he said he and lawyers William Gallion and Shirley Cunningham Jr., also of Lexington, held at Gallion’s house in 2001 to divvy up an extra $10 million beyond what they’d already paid themselves from the settlement. ""She has asked that those lawyers and another attorney, Stan Chesley of Cincinnati, who helped negotiate the settlement, be forced to surrender $62.6 million in funds as well as $59.5 million they paid themselves in fees. "

Thearticle.