The Times Leader reports on a $ 3.4 Million legal malpractice action taking place there, now, post verdict. The twist is that the winner of the case, executor of an estate had asked the trial judge to recuse himself because of financial conflict of interest.
"Attorneys for the Slusser family have asked Luzerne County Court…
This case from New Jersey illustrates the border line between behavior that is so bad that an expert is not needed at trial to testify on whether there was a deviation, and behavior that is bad, but still requires an expert. The NJ court found in TARUTIS, v. ALAN ACKERMAN and GREGORY WISOTSKY, that:
"No…
Arbitration clauses in attorney-client retainer agreements is a trend. Law firms, who presumably know the costs and efficiencies of litigation choose arbitration in the belief that most cases they are involved in will be a fee dispute. Legal malpractice, either as a counterclaim to a fee demand or on its own does sometimes intrude, however.…
Plaintiff wanted to sue his opponent’s attorneys. While the ability to sue your opponent’s attorney is very restricted, [see: lack of privity}, in certain circumstances it is possible. This case:
Blum v Perlstein
2008 NY Slip Op 00439
Decided on January 22, 2008
Appellate Division, Second Department
appears to stand for the proposition that plaintiff…
He was one of the best known, and feared plaintiff’s attorneys in New York. He had entire floors of offices at the Woolworth building in lower Manhattan, and early every morning a large number of trial attorneys would gather for breakfast and pick up their day’s work. The Eisen and Napoli firm won gazillions of dollars…
We reported this confluence of Politics, Legal Malpractice and big estate probate work several weeks ago. Defendants were R. Christopher Bell, the 2006 Democratic gubernatorial nominee and a former U.S. congressman; Annette M. Henry; and their former firm, Bell & Henry in Houston.
Today, the Texas Lawyer Blog writes: "former client’s breach-of-fiduciary duty…
Here, in an early report from the Competition Law 360 Blog is a report that:
"Kaye Scholer LLP is facing a legal malpractice suit over the way attorneys handled several antitrust suits accusing Celanese Americas Corp. of fixing the price of polyester staple fiber.
The suit, filed late last month in Dallas County, Texas, was…
In a familiar setting, this time the case is receiver v. former attorney. Other times it is bankruptcy trustee v. attorney. Southwest Exchange, a former Nevada financial company involved in litigation and in receivership ended 2007 owing $98 million to 130 real estate investors.
Now, in this familiar setting the receiver is suing the law firm of…
To what extent may a legal malpractice defendant seek disclosure of privileged discussions? The general answer is if they are "at issue" in the legal malpractice. Here in the Akin Gump legal malpractice case is a good example. From Law.Com:
"Manhattan appeals court has narrowed the scope of discovery Akin Gump Strauss Hauer &…
As part of the "but for" rule, a hypothetical judgment which plaintiff would have won, except for the attorney’s mistake, is the measure of damages in legal malpractice. We have written about this in the New York Law Journal. [4/20/07] The defense of collectibility is that even if successful in the case below, plaintiff…
