Our partner New York Medical Malpractice Lawyer Jeffrey Bloom was recently invited to appear on Today’s Verdict show hosted by David Lesch to discuss legal malpractice and medical malpractice (see the video of the show below)
Our firm receives many phone calls from people who are upset with their lawyer or unhappy with the result of their lawsuit. Attorneys do make mistakes however not every mistake is grounds for a lawsuit. It is not just because you are upset with your lawyer that you can sue him. Someone has a legal malpractice case if it can be proven that not only the lawyer was negligent not but also that the client would have won the underlying case. This is also the reason why our firm only handles legal malpractice cases related to personal injury including Medical Malpractice. Often cases we handle are related to issues involving missed statute of limitations and court deadlines.
In the video below Jeff discusses a legal malpractice case in which the underlying case is a medical malpractice case that he is working on now. The case involves a patient who died in the emergency room of an Upstate New York hospital. The patient showed up at the emergency room complaining about chest pain. The nurse saw him and noted that the patient needed a cardiac consult. The patient then waited for 4 to 5 hours to be seen. While waiting he died from cardiac arrest at the hospital. The family of the victim retained a lawyer to sue the hospital. The lawyer who handled the case didn’t file the lawsuit and missed the statute of limitations date which is 2 years for wrongful death and 2 and a half years for medical malpractice. The lawyer then tried to forge documents to make his clients believe that the case was re-opened.
To win this legal malpractice case Jeff will have to prove not only that the attorney was negligent but also that the underlying medical malpractice case would have been won. It’s two trials in one.
This is the reason our firm will only handle legal malpractice cases within the areas of our expertise.