Friedman v. Eisenstein

Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of New York

Friedman v. Eisenstein

263 A.D.2d 367, 694 N.Y.S.2d 25, 1999 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 7799

CourtAppellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York

DecidedJuly 1, 1999

StatusPublished

Cited by3 cases

This text of 263 A.D.2d 367 (Friedman v. Eisenstein) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook

Friedman v. Eisenstein, 263 A.D.2d 367, 694 N.Y.S.2d 25, 1999 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 7799 (N.Y. Ct. App. 1999).

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Opinion

—Judgment, Supreme Court, New York County (Shelia Abdus-Salaam, J.), entered October 9, 1998, in an action between former law partners concerning the splitting of a contingency fee earned after the dissolution of their partnership, awarding plaintiff damages with prejudgment interest, unanimously affirmed, without costs.

We agree with the IAS Court that based on the plain terms of the fee-sharing agreement the parties entered into upon dissolving their partnership, and defendant’s own description of his services in connection with the case that generated the contingency fee in issue, defendant earned only a 6.5% “preparation fee”, not a 12.5% “trial fee”, and that plaintiff was not required to perform any legal services in that case in order to be entitled to whatever remained of the fee after defendant’s 6.5% share. Prejudgment interest on that remainder dating back to defendant’s receipt of the fee was properly awarded. By statute, in an action for breach of contract, “[ijnterest shall be recovered” and “shall be computed from the earliest ascertainable date the cause of action existed” (CPLR 5001 [a], [b]), the statute making no provision for any delay in the action attributable to the plaintiff. Concur — Williams, J. P., Mazzarelli, Lerner and Buckley, JJ.

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—Judgment, Supreme Court, New York County (Shelia Abdus-Salaam, J.), entered October 9, 1998, in an action between former law partners concerning the splitting of a contingency fee earned after the dissolution of their partnership, awarding plaintiff damages with prejudgment interest, unanimously affirmed, without costs.

We agree with the IAS Court that based on the plain terms of the fee-sharing agreement the parties entered into upon dissolving their partnership, and defendant’s own description of his services in connection with the case that generated the contingency fee in issue, defendant earned only a 6.5% “preparation fee”, not a 12.5% “trial fee”, and that plaintiff was not required to perform any legal services in that case in order to be entitled to whatever remained of the fee after defendant’s 6.5% share. Prejudgment interest on that remainder dating back to defendant’s receipt of the fee was properly awarded. By statute, in an action for breach of contract, “[ijnterest shall be recovered” and “shall be computed from the earliest ascertainable date the cause of action existed” (CPLR 5001 [a], [b]), the statute making no provision for any delay in the action attributable to the plaintiff. Concur — Williams, J. P., Mazzarelli, Lerner and Buckley, JJ.

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Bluebook (online)

263 A.D.2d 367, 694 N.Y.S.2d 25, 1999 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 7799, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/friedman-v-eisenstein-nyappdiv-1999.

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