Editor’s Note: The following article is based on findings about what the four Appellate Division departments have been deciding about legal malpractice during the last five years. Future articles will continue to share findings from the data set, containing 357 published decisions.
Over the 25 years I’ve been teaching torts, I keep passing along the same remark to first-year students. “If you remember only one thing from this class, don’t blow the statute of limitations.” Doing so is embarrassing for a lawyer, or should be. Failing to file a claim during the limitation period is the most basic way to breach one’s duty to a personal-injury client. Ordinary care by an attorney can almost always fend off this problem.
