I have written in the past about whether a plaintiff in a legal malpractice action arising out of the alleged mishandling of the plaintiff’s underlying case should have to prove not only that the firm committed malpractice and that damages would have been awarded if malpractice had not occurred but…
I know I did a post on this subject a couple of weeks ago, linking to a site that had some techniques to help lawyers avoid malpractice claims. But here is another site with yet another handy list of fourteen ways to avoid a claim. A sample taken directly from the site: …
This post from the New York Attorney Malpractice Blog includes the full text of an article from New York Lawyer titled "Legal Malpractice Cases May Surge as the Economy Tanks." The article says that " [a] recent American Bar Association (ABA) study that looked at legal malpractice claims filed between…
The American Bar Association has a nice paper titled "The Top Ten Malpractice Traps and How to Avoid Them." The paper is excerpted from "Desk Guide Legal Malpractice." Not all of the "traps" are applicable to those who do tort work on a full-time basis, but there is a lot…
The Ohio Supreme Court has ruled that a plaintiff in a legal malpractice case must prove the collectibility of damages in "the case within the case" to recover them from a negligent lawyer. In doing so, it specifically rejected the notion that the defendant lawyer must prove the lack of…
Negligence without causation is like a biscuit without country ham (or blackberry jam). Now, I’m not so sure that juries pay as much attention to the concept as lawyers and judges, but causation is an element of every cause of action in the tort world. This decision out of Michigan…
Rudolf fired his lawyers after a jury trial that resulted in a 50% finding of comparative fault and a total verdict of $250,000. He then hired a new lawyer, got a new trial, and then settled his case for $750,000. Next, he sued his original lawyers for malpractice, saying that he failed…
The Hawaii Supreme Court has ruled that two law firms who represented a party in a business dispute cannot be sued by the adversary party for intentional interference with contractual relations. Plaintiff had a dispute with a business partner – the two were general partners of a partnership that ran…
Last Fall I wrote several posts ( here and here) on a one portion of the causation issue in legal malpractice cases. A summary of my view: I believe that a plaintiff in a legal malpractice case arising out of a claim that a personal injury case was mis-handled must prove…
The Court of Appeal of California has ruled that a lawyer may be sued for failure to warn a client that the failure to settle a claim against the client would put the client at risk for paying the adversary’s attorneys fees. The Court held that it was not appropriate to dismiss the…