| West Vil. Assoc. Ltd. Partnership v Balber Pickard BattistoniMaldonado & Ver Dan Tuin, PC |
| 2008 NY Slip Op 01844 [49 AD3d 270] |
| March 4, 2008 |
| Appellate Division, First Department |
| West Village Associates Limited Partnership, Also Known as WestVillage Association and West Village Houses, et al., Appellants, v Balber PickardBattistoni Maldonado & Ver Dan Tuin, PC, et al., Respondents. |
—[*1] Wilson, Elser, Moskowitz, Edelman & Dicker LLP, New York City (Thomas A. Leghorn ofcounsel), for respondents.
Order, Supreme Court, New York County (Edward H. Lehner, J.), entered January 18, 2007,which granted defendants' pre-answer motion to dismiss the amended complaint, unanimouslymodified, on the law, the claims for legal malpractice reinstated, and otherwise affirmed, withoutcosts.
A legal malpractice claim accrues when the malpractice is committed (Glamm vAllen, 57 NY2d 87, 93 [1982]), not when the client discovers it. Under the "continuousrepresentation" doctrine, however, a client cannot reasonably be expected to assess the quality ofthe professional service while it is still in progress (see Greene v Greene, 56 NY2d 86,94-95 [1982]). The doctrine is "generally limited to the course of representation concerning aspecific legal matter," and thus is "not applicable to a client's . . . continuing generalrelationship with a lawyer . . . involving only routine contact for miscellaneouslegal representation . . . unrelated to the matter upon which the allegations ofmalpractice are predicated" (Shumsky v Eisenstein, 96 NY2d 164, 168 [2001]). Thepleading must assert more than simply an extended general relationship between the professionaland client, and the facts are required to demonstrate continued representation in the specificmatter directly under dispute.
The complaint here went beyond mere allegations that defendants continuously representedplaintiffs in a general professional relationship after the specific act of malpractice occurred(cf. Zaref v Berk & Michaels, 192 AD2d 346, 348 [1993]), specifically alleging thecontinued advice they received from defendants regarding rent regulation, as a result of whichthey failed to take appropriate steps to assure the subject property would be free from rentregulation. As a result, plaintiffs stated a cause of action that was not barred by the statute oflimitations (see Greene, 56 NY2d at 95).
Finally, plaintiffs sufficiently alleged bases for liability against the individual defendantsunder Business Corporation Law § 1505 (a) (cf. Ecker v Zwaik & Bernstein, 240AD2d 360, 361-362 [1997]).[*2]
We have reviewed plaintiffs' other contentions and findthem without merit. Concur—Andrias, J.P., Friedman, Buckley, McGuire and Moskowitz,JJ.