Some years ago there was a thriving cottage industry in creating tax shelters.  It took the IRS a few years to catch up, but it did so with a vengeance. Boesky v Levine 2021 NY Slip Op 02059 Decided on April 01, 2021 Appellate Division, First Department is the story of an attorneys travels through a number of firms and how the statute of limitations and continuous representation work to track him.

“The motion court properly dismissed as time barred the legal malpractice claims that pertain to legal services received from Levine and Herrick Feinstein from 2002-2005. The complaint does not allege that at the time defendant Levine provided legal services to plaintiffs regarding structuring and investing in the tax shelters from 2002-2005, the parties contemplated future services in connection therewith. Nor does the complaint contain allegations that there was continuous representation from 2002 forward regarding the structuring of the tax shelters (Johnson v Proskauer Rose LLP, 129 AD3d 59, 67-68 [1st Dept 2015]). However, the complaint sufficiently alleges that Levine subsequently represented plaintiffs in connection with audits by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and New York Department of Taxation and Finance (NYDTF) and in tax litigation continuously from May 16, 2008, the date Boesky signed a power of attorney permitting Levine to represent him before the NYDTF, through 2016. Whether the advice Levine allegedly dispensed with regard to the audits and litigation was provided solely in his capacity as tax matters partner for one of the limited liability companies in which plaintiffs invested, and not as their attorney, is an issue of fact that cannot be resolved on the pleadings.

The claim should also be reinstated against Herrick Feinstein (see Waggoner v Caruso, 68 AD3d 1, 6-7 [1st Dept 2009], affd 14 NY3d 874 [2010] [finding that sound policy considerations support the tolling of the statute of limitations under the continuous representation doctrine while the representation of the same matter in which the malpractice is alleged is ongoing]). This Court, in HNH Intl., Ltd. v Pryor Cashman Sherman & Flynn LLP (63 AD3d 534, 535 [2009]), held that the statute of limitations was tolled as to a malpractice claim against a law firm because the attorney(s) who handled the case continued to represent the plaintiffs in the same matter, albeit while at different law firms. Additionally, the claim should be reinstated against Moritt Hock for the period from September 2012 through 2016, when Levine was a partner at the firm and was [*2]allegedly still representing plaintiffs in connection with the audits and tax litigation. The complaint sufficiently alleges that Levine, while at Moritt, continued to advise plaintiffs regarding the tax litigation and sufficiently alleges that but for Levine’s continued failure to properly advise them of the weaknesses of their case, they would have settled with the IRS to reduce their financial exposure and litigation costs.

While the complaint sufficiently states a cause of action for fraud, it is time barred. The statute of limitations for fraud is the greater of six years from when the cause of action accrued or two years from when the fraud was discovered or with reasonable diligence should have been discovered (CPLR 213[8]). The cause of action for fraud accrued between 2002 and 2004 when plaintiffs entered into the allegedly fraudulent transactions (Kanterakis v Kanterakis, 125 AD3d 814, 816 [2d Dept 2015]; Hamrick v Schain Leifer Guralnick, 146 AD3d 606, 607 [1st Dept 2017], affg 2015 WL 5162542, at *4 [Sup Ct, NY County 2015]). Moreover, by 2014, plaintiffs were on notice that the IRS and NYDTF deemed the tax shelters in which they invested a tax avoidance scheme, that defendants Levine and Katz were self-dealing with regard to these tax shelters of questionable legitimacy that they promoted to plaintiffs, and that Levine was involved in other alleged illegal tax schemes. “Where the circumstances are such as to suggest to a person of ordinary intelligence the probability that he has been defrauded, a duty of inquiry arises, and if he omits that inquiry when it would have developed the truth, . . . knowledge of the fraud will be imputed to him” (Aozora Bank, Ltd. v Credit Suisse Group, 144 AD3d 437, 438 [1st Dept 2016], quoting Gutkin v Siegal, 85 AD3d 687, 688 [1st Dept 2011]). Here, plaintiffs had information suggesting they had been defrauded but failed to allege any facts demonstrating that they engaged in “the exercise of reasonable diligence.” Thus, knowledge of the fraud is imputed to plaintiffs (id. at 439-440), and because they did not commence this action until more than two years later, in February 2017, the fraud claim is time-barred. Moreover, since the fraud claim is time-barred, the claim for conspiracy to commit fraud, which is not an independent cause of action in New York, is not viable (EVEMeta, LLC v Siemens Convergence Creators Corp., 173 AD3d 551, 553 [1st Dept 2019]).”

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.