Legal Malpractice

Legal Malpractice Suit after a Release

By (Andrew Lavoott Bluestone)

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 had no legal malpractice case against the defendants, who were not his attorneys.  Supreme Court dismissed that aspect of the case, and the Appellate Division agreed.  However, the AD went on to dismiss the non-legal malpractice portions, which included breach of fiduciary duty, on the basis that a release of the original defendant in the case, and his "agents" included a release of the attorneys.

"the defendants demonstrated that the allegedly improper conduct that they engaged in, which predated a general release that the plaintiff executed before he commenced the instant action, came within the ambit of that release. The defendants also demonstrated that the release applied to them, as they represented the releasee, and the plaintiff discharged the releasee and its "agents" from liability (see Berkowitz v Fischbein, Badillo, Wagner & Harding, 7 AD3d 385, 387; Argyle Capital Mgt. Corp. v Lowenthal, Landau, Fischer & Brings, P.C., 261 AD2d 282)."

Full post as published by New York Attorney Malpractice Blog on February 26, 2008 (boomark / email).