Harris

In this action for breach of a settlement agreement, both sides moved for summary judgment. The trial court granted plaintiff’s motion and denied defendants’ motion. Defendants moved for reconsideration, for an order setting aside and vacating the judgment and for a new trial. The trial court denied those motions and awarded sanctions against defendants on the latter two motions. We reverse the judgment for plaintiff because defendants raised triable issues of fact as to whether they were entitled to rescind the agreement based on a mutual mistake of fact or law. We affirm the award of sanctions which arose from a different issue.

Facts and Proceedings Below

Plaintiff Dennis A. Harris retained the law firm of Rudin, Richman & Appel to prepare an irrevocable inter vivos trust for him. He subsequently brought a malpractice action against the firm and five of its members, Milton Rudin, Fredric Richman, Martin Appel, Raymond Kaplan and Jeffrey Berkowitz, alleging they had prepared the trust in such a way the trustees were exposed to personal liability for gift and estate taxes on distributions under the trust. Kaplan was dismissed from the malpractice action several months…