Epiphany Community Nursery Sch. v Levey  2019 NY Slip Op 00842  Decided on February 5, 2019  Appellate Division, First Department  Singh, J., J. is not primarily about accounting malpractice.  That nugget is merely part of a much larger fraud which seemed to swamp a NYC private school.  The intra-familial fraud is stunning.

“In 1973 Wendy Levey (Wendy) married defendant Hugh Levey (Hugh). Two years later Wendy founded Epiphany, a not-for-profit corporation that operates a kindergarten and nursery school on the Upper East Side of Manhattan.

Hugh is an investment banker with an undergraduate degree from Yale University and a M.B.A. from Harvard. Hugh and defendant Claire Gruppo co-founded defendant Gruppo Levey & Co. (GLC), a small investment banking firm that provides strategic advice and private capital raising services to businesses, financial sponsors and management teams throughout the United States. Defendant Gruppo, Levey Holdings Inc. (GLH) is GLC’s parent company, and defendant Frog Pond Partners L.P. (Frog Pond) is a limited partnership owned indirectly by Hugh and Gruppo. Of this group, all but Hugh are the “collateral defendants.” Defendant Davie Kaplan CPA, P.C. (Davie Kaplan) was an outside auditor for Epiphany from 2010 to 2012.

The complaint alleges two sets of fraudulent acts. These acts were allegedly uncovered in a matrimonial action between Wendy and Hugh that was settled in October 2016. Wendy and Hugh are now divorced.

The first series of fraudulent acts occurred between 2002 and 2003 when Hugh induced Epiphany to sell its extracurricular programs to nonparty Magic Management LLC (Magic) for an unreasonably low price. At that time, Hugh had a 100% ownership interest in defendant January Management, Inc., general partner of nonparty January Partners, L.P., which was the sole member of Magic.

Pursuant to an asset purchase agreement dated February 12, 2003, Epiphany sold its extracurricular programs to Magic for $300,000, $30,000 of which was paid in cash and the remaining $270,000 was to be paid pursuant to a promissory note payable over 10 years in installments of $27,000, plus interest. Magic also agreed to pay monthly rent to use Epiphany’s facilities. Hugh claimed that although Magic occupied less than 10% of Epiphany’s space, Magic’s rent would be $481,026. Magic’s rent was represented to be more than $100,000 above Epiphany’s rent for the building.

Wendy, Epiphany’s Executive Director, did not have a financial background. She believed it was in the school’s best interest to have someone with Hugh’s financial expertise to assist with Epiphany’s financial affairs. Wendy signed the asset purchase agreement on Epiphany’s behalf without obtaining her own appraisal or verifying whether Magic paid the school what it owed.

The complaint alleges that the $300,000 purchase price was based on a fraudulent valuation commissioned by Hugh, which was “substantially inaccurate.” By applying false figures, Hugh allegedly reduced the purchase price by $1.5 million. The complaint further alleges that if the valuation had been properly calculated the purchase price would have exceeded $1.8 million.

In addition, Magic failed to pay rent or the amount owed on the promissory note. The complaint alleges that Hugh manipulated Epiphany’s corporate and financial records to hide Magic’s failure to pay.

The second set of fraudulent acts allegedly took place between 2007 and 2013. Hugh made unauthorized transfers of over $5.9 million from Epiphany’s bank accounts to himself and some of the collateral defendants by linking the bank accounts to his private banking portfolio. Hugh, with the assistance of Davie Kaplan, falsely recorded these transfers in Epiphany’s general ledgers as “loans.” However, there were no documents to memorialize these “loans.” Nor were [*2]any loan payments ever made. The “loans” were subsequently characterized as “other receivables.” At the end of each year, the other receivables were offset by fake charges Epiphany owed GLC or GLH for “consulting fees” and “lease commissions.”

In September 2010, Hugh allegedly arranged for his long-time personal accountant, David Pitcher, who was employed by defendant Davie Kaplan to serve as Epiphany’s outside auditor. Davie Kaplan delivered 2010, 2011, and 2012 audit reports. Davie Kaplan also performed an audit for fiscal year 2013 but it did not issue a 2013 audit report.

Epiphany commenced this action on August 31, 2016. It alleges 13 causes of action, including: (1) fraud by Hugh and Davie Kaplan; (2) aiding and abetting fraud by collateral defendants and Davie Kaplan; (3) breach of fiduciary duty by Hugh; and (4) aiding and abetting breach of fiduciary duty by the collateral defendants and Davie Kaplan.”

“Finally, we affirm Supreme Court’s dismissal of the fraud, aiding and abetting fraud and breach of fiduciary claims against Davie Kaplan as duplicative of Epiphany’s untimely accounting malpractice claim (see Murray Hill Invs. v Parker Chapin Flattau & Klimpl, LLP, 305 AD2d 228 [1st Dept 2003] [affirming dismissal of fraud claim as duplicative of the untimely legal malpractice claim, and noting that it was asserted in an attempt to circumvent the legal malpractice limitations period])”

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Andrew Lavoott Bluestone

Andrew Lavoott Bluestone has been an attorney for 40 years, with a career that spans criminal prosecution, civil litigation and appellate litigation. Mr. Bluestone became an Assistant District Attorney in Kings County in 1978, entered private practice in 1984 and in 1989 opened…

Andrew Lavoott Bluestone has been an attorney for 40 years, with a career that spans criminal prosecution, civil litigation and appellate litigation. Mr. Bluestone became an Assistant District Attorney in Kings County in 1978, entered private practice in 1984 and in 1989 opened his private law office and took his first legal malpractice case.

Since 1989, Bluestone has become a leader in the New York Plaintiff’s Legal Malpractice bar, handling a wide array of plaintiff’s legal malpractice cases arising from catastrophic personal injury, contracts, patents, commercial litigation, securities, matrimonial and custody issues, medical malpractice, insurance, product liability, real estate, landlord-tenant, foreclosures and has defended attorneys in a limited number of legal malpractice cases.

Bluestone also took an academic role in field, publishing the New York Attorney Malpractice Report from 2002-2004.  He started the “New York Attorney Malpractice Blog” in 2004, where he has published more than 4500 entries.

Mr. Bluestone has written 38 scholarly peer-reviewed articles concerning legal malpractice, many in the Outside Counsel column of the New York Law Journal. He has appeared as an Expert witness in multiple legal malpractice litigations.

Mr. Bluestone is an adjunct professor of law at St. John’s University College of Law, teaching Legal Malpractice.  Mr. Bluestone has argued legal malpractice cases in the Second Circuit, in the New York State Court of Appeals, each of the four New York Appellate Divisions, in all four of  the U.S. District Courts of New York and in Supreme Courts all over the state.  He has also been admitted pro haec vice in the states of Connecticut, New Jersey and Florida and was formally admitted to the US District Court of Connecticut and to its Bankruptcy Court all for legal malpractice matters. He has been retained by U.S. Trustees in legal malpractice cases from Bankruptcy Courts, and has represented municipalities, insurance companies, hedge funds, communications companies and international manufacturing firms. Mr. Bluestone regularly lectures in CLEs on legal malpractice.

Based upon his professional experience Bluestone was named a Diplomate and was Board Certified by the American Board of Professional Liability Attorneys in 2008 in Legal Malpractice. He remains Board Certified.  He was admitted to The Best Lawyers in America from 2012-2019.  He has been featured in Who’s Who in Law since 1993.

In the last years, Mr. Bluestone has been featured for two particularly noteworthy legal malpractice cases.  The first was a settlement of an $11.9 million dollar default legal malpractice case of Yeo v. Kasowitz, Benson, Torres & Friedman which was reported in the NYLJ on August 15, 2016. Most recently, Mr. Bluestone obtained a rare plaintiff’s verdict in a legal malpractice case on behalf of the City of White Plains v. Joseph Maria, reported in the NYLJ on February 14, 2017. It was the sole legal malpractice jury verdict in the State of New York for 2017.

Bluestone has been at the forefront of the development of legal malpractice principles and has contributed case law decisions, writing and lecturing which have been recognized by his peers.  He is regularly mentioned in academic writing, and his past cases are often cited in current legal malpractice decisions. He is recognized for his ample writings on Judiciary Law § 487, a 850 year old statute deriving from England which relates to attorney deceit.