As you will remember, in the Fendi case, a NJ boutique sued Weil Gotshal for legal malpractice based upon claims of conflict of interest. The conflict was said to be in representing both the boutique and Fendi or its parents too. The case went to trial with great publicity and settled just prior to summations. An attorney, fairly new to the case, took it from just prior to trial to settlement.

But now a case specific blog amusingly entitled WE’LL GETCHA & MANGLE” is saying that Nathan Dershowitz has been retained to ask for a mistrial in a case never settled. Truth or bunk? Keep tuned. Details.

Attorney Salhi was solicitor for a NJ board of education, and was sitting in on a board meeting when a board employee appeared to complain about affirmative action programs, and their shortcomings. The attorney was designated as “secretary pro-tem” and wrote up the minutes. After this and many intervening events [recounted in the decision], he was sued, and then turned to the board for indemnification as attorney. Result? No indemnification, and his legal mal insurer had to pay the bill. Details.

It is the rule in NY that a plaintiff may sue its attorney for failure to appeal or perfect an appeal. The burden of proof is no different than for any other case: did the attorney deviate from good practice, was that deviation the proximate cause of damage, and was plaintiff damaged?

The difference is that in NY, it is always a bench trial. Questions of whether there would have been a different result on appeal is never a jury question, and always a decision for the judge. Today Illiois Legal Malpractice blog reports similar decisions nationwide. Details.

In today’s New York Law Journal, Kenneth Block and Jeffrey Steiner report on the liability of attorneys, to non-clients, based upon false assurrances. They write:

“As a result of recent litigation in New York1 and elsewhere2 involving claims against attorneys and accountants, we thought it would be helpful to revisit fundamental principles of third party liability as they relate to a lending transaction. Claims of third party liability arise in the context of allegedly false representations and assurances made by attorneys and accountants in opinion letters and financial statements. In the event of a subsequent loan default and loss to the lender, the lender may look to third parties upon whom the lender relied in order to mitigate the loss. The borrower’s attorneys and accountants may then come within the lender’s litigation sights.

The Issue of Privity

The threshold determination a court must make before permitting a party to recover in tort for economic loss resulting from another’s negligent misrepresentation is whether there has been an adequate showing of contractual privity between the parties or a relationship so close as to approach that of privity.3 While the issue of contractual privity between attorney and client is easily defined and rarely disputed, whether a non-client and attorney sustain a relationship approaching privity proves to be more ambiguous. While a borrower’s counsel is clearly not in contractual privity with a lender, when the link between the borrower’s counsel and the lender is sufficiently close to privity, a duty of care is established between the lender and the attorney.4 Should a lender sustain a pecuniary loss resulting from reliance on false assurances set forth in an opinion letter, the lender may have recourse against the borrower’s attorney in the form of a negligent misrepresentation claim.”

We’ve reported on this case in months past. Here is the latest from the NYLJ.“Attorneys in the malpractice lawsuit against Barry C. Scheck and his firm, Cochran, Neufeld & Scheck, have agreed to mediation before Eastern District Magistrate Judge Steven M. Gold. The state Court of Appeals recently ruled that Mr. Long, who was exonerated from rape and robbery convictions, had a valid claim against New York in the Court of Claims. However, the Court of Appeals found that his complaint had to be dismissed because he did not personally verify it. Mr. Scheck verified the complaint. At a hearing yesterday, Mr. Long’s attorney, Joel Berger, and Mr. Scheck’s attorney, Ronald C. Minkoff, agreed to mediation. Mr. Long is seeking $3 million. The parties will next convene in September. — Tom Perrotta “

Gardner Carton & Douglas and one of its former attorneys “have been sued for legal malpractice and breach of fiduciary responsibility in connection with the 2004 sale of the Scholl College building on the city’s Gold Coast.”
“The North Chicago-based medical school alleges that Mr. Loren conspired with Stuart Levine, who then headed the school’s real estate committee, to sell the property at 1001 N. Dearborn St. to Smithfield Properties LLC in a “friendly deal” that would have netted much less than what rival bidders said they would have offered. “

The Lakin firm has received a great deal of publicity in the legal malpractice world. We have several articles over the past year, all of which may be accessed by suing the “search” box. Here a young woman, injured by a falling limb, was told that she could receive “millions” only to be dropped. She sues Lakin in legal malpractice. Details.