Edwards filed the lawsuit filed by Cal Dive and his insurer with Edwards` airline. Continental, the airline for legal errors, denied coverage, saying (1) Cal Dive did not allege any act or omission in providing legal services; and (2) the damages sought by Cal Dive were “attorneys` fees” excluded from the policy. In Parkinson v. Bevis, 165 Idaho 599 (2019), the Idaho Supreme Court was faced with a first impression as to whether a lawyer can be sued for breach of fiduciary duty as a separate plea of legal error. In this case, a lawyer forwarded a confidential email from a client to the opposing counsel. The email was forwarded after the case was settled and did not result in any economic loss to the plaintiff. Nevertheless, the client sued the lawyer for breach of fiduciary duty. The defence contended that the appeal should be dismissed on the ground that the plea was essentially an allegation of error of law requiring actual damage attributable to the applicant. The District Court accepted and dismissed the action because the client had not suffered any economic damage.
The court also rejected Obentine`s argument that the collection was excessive because it did not take into account the costs, taxes and other expenses he had incurred in the case. Under California law, restitution claims are measured by what was taken from plaintiffs, the court said. The underlying case, a class action lawsuit filed in 2009, involved infringement claims for the purchase of units in what would become Cosmopolitan in Las Vegas. In 2011, the plaintiffs filed a class action lawsuit in federal court against their former class action plaintiff, including Obenstine, for professional misconduct, breach of fiduciary duty, and fraud. If you have incurred attorneys` fees as a result of your lawyer`s negligence or misconduct, please contact us to discuss your options. Since 1989, Bluestone has been a leader in the New York Chamber of Claimants for legal errors, handling a wide range of plaintiffs` legal errors arising from catastrophic personal injury, contracts, patents, commercial litigation, securities, marriage and custody issues, medical malpractice, insurance, product liability, real estate, landlord-tenant, foreclosure, and has defended lawyers in a limited number of cases of legal error. M. Bluestone is the author of 38 peer-reviewed articles on legal errors, many of them in the Outside Counsel column of the New York Law Journal. He acted as an expert witness in several erroneous proceedings.
The scope of recoverable damages for error of title is much more limited than that of damages for general negligence. Regardless of the nature of the error or omission challenged, there is no right to an actionable error of law if the lawyer`s act (or omission) did not affect the outcome of the dispute. In recent years, Mr. Bluestone has been brought forward for two particularly notable cases of errors of law. The first was a settlement of an $11.9 million legal error case by Yeo v. Kasowitz, Benson, Torres & Friedman, reported in the NYLJ on August 15, 2016. More recently, Mr. Bluestone received a rare plaintiff judgment in a case of legal error on behalf of the City of White Plains against Joseph Maria, which was reported in the NYLJ on February 14, 2017. It was the only jury verdict in New York State for 2017. Notwithstanding the foregoing, the plaintiff may recover attorneys` fees incurred to pursue a claim against a third party or defend against claims of a third party if such actions are a direct result of legal misconduct.
(Orrick Herrington & Sutcliffe LLP v Sup. Ct., supra, 107 Cal.App.4th at 1059-1060.) The court rejected Continental`s arguments. The tribunal found that Continental was in favour of oversimplifying the issue. The case did not present itself as an “ordinary” litigation over legal fees. Apparently, Edwards acted as a lawyer who provided legal services to Schmidt by representing him and negotiating the settlement. Unlike typical fee disputes that arise between clients and attorneys in the resolution of a case, the Cal Dive trial involved attempting to settle and rescind an entire settlement agreement and all proceeds paid that Edwards had negotiated on Schmidt`s behalf based on allegations of Schmidt`s misconduct. Without Edwards` attorney-client relationship with Schmidt, the court found that the claims against Edwards would not have proceeded.