Here is a short but complete description of duplicitive pleading in professional negligence cases.  It is found in Delphi Healthcare PLLC v Petrella Phillips LLP   2018 NY Slip Op 01012  Decided on February 9, 2018  Appellate Division, Fourth Department.

“Causes of action for negligence, breach of contract and breach of fiduciary duty are duplicative of professional malpractice causes of action where they are based on the same factual allegations and seek similar damages (see Board of Trustees of IBEW Local 43 Elec. Contrs. Health & Welfare, Annuity & Pension Funds v D’Arcangelo & Co., LLP, 124 AD3d 1358, 1360 [4th Dept 2015]; Dischiavi v Calli [appeal No. 2], 68 AD3d 1691, 1693 [4th Dept 2009]; TVGA Eng’g, Surveying, P.C. v Gallick [appeal No. 2], 45 AD3d 1252, 1256 [4th Dept 2007]). Here, the negligence and breach of fiduciary duty causes of action are duplicative of the accounting malpractice cause of action inasmuch as they share the same set of underlying facts and seek the same damages as that cause of action. Moreover, the allegation in the breach of fiduciary duty cause of action that defendants concealed their errors and omissions from plaintiffs does not differentiate that cause of action from the accounting malpractice cause of action inasmuch as “there is no independent cause of action for concealing’ malpractice” (Zarin v Reid & Priest, 184 AD2d 385, 387 [1st Dept 1992]).

Upon construing the complaint liberally, and affording plaintiffs the benefit of every possible favorable inference (see generally Leon v Martinez, 84 NY2d 83, 87-88 [1994]), we reject defendants’ contention that the breach of contract cause of action is duplicative of the accounting malpractice cause of action. The breach of contract cause of action is based on allegations that defendants breached their agreements with plaintiffs by failing to perform certain services, and that plaintiffs are entitled to recover all compensation paid to defendants for those unperformed services. That is separate and distinct from the allegations in the accounting malpractice cause of action, which seeks damages based on allegations that defendants did perform services pursuant to the contract but failed to comply with the accepted standards of care.”

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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.