Bozeman, MontanaBozeman Legal Malpractice
Bozeman Legal Malpractice Lawyers: Attorney Negligence in Real Estate, Water Rights, Estate and Injury Cases in Gallatin County
Boland Aarab PLLP.
If a lawyer’s mistake cost you a case, a property sale, water rights or an inheritance in the Bozeman area, you may have a legal malpractice claim. You must prove the lawyer failed to use reasonable care and skill and that the failure caused a real, measurable loss, usually with expert testimony. You generally have three years from discovering the error, and never more than ten.
Believe a lawyer’s mistake cost you? Contact Boland Aarab PLLP for a free consultation at (406) 315-3737.
What kinds of legal work lead to malpractice claims in the Gallatin Valley?
Malpractice claims follow the legal work a community depends on. In Gallatin County, rapid growth and high land values raise the stakes of routine legal tasks:
- Real estate and development. Purchase agreements, easements, access roads, subdivision approvals, covenants and short-term-rental restrictions. A missed easement or a poorly drafted contract on valley or Big Sky property can cost far more than the legal fee.
- Water rights. Water is valuable in the Gallatin and Madison basins, and many ranch and development deals depend on it. The Montana Water Court, which adjudicates existing water rights statewide, sits in Bozeman at 1123 Research Drive (Montana Water Court). Missed objection deadlines, poorly handled claims and water rights left out of a sale can cause lasting loss.
- Estate planning for ranch and business families. Wills, trusts and succession plans for land that has appreciated sharply. Errors may not surface until years later, when the 10-year outer limit becomes critical.
- Business formation and sales. Startups, outdoor-industry businesses and professional practices whose entity documents, operating agreements or sale terms failed to protect the client.
- Injury and civil cases. A missed statute of limitations, a claim against a government body never presented in writing, a case dismissed for failure to prosecute, or a settlement offer never passed along.
What happens when you suspect malpractice in a Bozeman matter?
Protect the underlying matter first. If your original case or deal can still be saved, that comes before anything else. Deadlines in the underlying matter may still be running.
Get your file. Ask the lawyer or firm, in writing, for your complete client file. Keep every email, letter, bill and document you have, and write down a timeline of what you were told and when.
A grievance is not a lawsuit. You can file a complaint about attorney misconduct with the Office of Disciplinary Counsel in Helena (Montana Courts, Attorney Complaints). Discipline can protect the public, but it does not compensate you. A malpractice lawsuit is a separate civil claim for your losses.
Why an outside firm helps. Gallatin County’s legal community is close-knit. Lawyers who practice together, refer cases to each other and appear before the same judges may be reluctant to evaluate a colleague’s work. A firm from outside the community can review what happened without those ties.
The court. A malpractice case against a Bozeman lawyer or firm is usually filed in the Eighteenth Judicial District Court at the Gallatin County Law and Justice Center, 515 South 16th Avenue, Bozeman (§ 3-5-101, MCA). If the underlying matter was in federal court or the lawyer is from another state, federal jurisdiction in the Butte Division may be possible (D. Mont. L.R. 1.2).
Montana law that applies
Our Montana legal malpractice lawyer page explains the law in more detail. In brief:
- Four elements: duty, breach, injury and proximate cause (Labair v. Carey, 2012 MT 312; Labair). An attorney-client relationship establishes the duty.
- Experts are almost always required. With limited exceptions, “only expert testimony can establish the standard of care” (Babcock Place Ltd. P’ship v. Berg, Lilly, Andriolo & Tollefsen, P.C., 2003 MT 111).
- The “case within a case.” When the error happened in a lawsuit, you must usually show the underlying case would have come out better (Lorash v. Epstein, 236 Mont. 21 (1989)). In a transaction, the question is what protection a careful lawyer would have built in, and what its absence cost.
- Deadline: 3 years from when you discovered or should have discovered the error, but never more than 10 years from the error itself (§ 27-2-206, MCA).
Is a bad result the same as malpractice?
No. Lawyers make judgment calls, and cases are lost for many reasons. A malpractice claim requires a mistake that a reasonably careful Montana lawyer would not have made, and a loss that can be measured. In a Bozeman real estate or water-rights matter, that often means proving what the property or right was worth with the protection in place, and what it is worth without it. Sometimes the loss cannot be measured until a dispute with the other side of the deal is resolved. We will tell you honestly whether the facts support a claim.
Why hire a Great Falls firm for a Bozeman case?
Legal malpractice cases are two cases in one, and they are decided by expert testimony and careful proof of the underlying matter. We are based in Great Falls, handle malpractice claims across Montana, and our attorneys travel to Bozeman for depositions, hearings and trial. We do not have a Bozeman office, which for many clients in a malpractice case is part of the point: we have no working relationship with the lawyer whose work is in question.
The Boland Aarab Way
- Trial lawyers. Our attorneys have spent more than 4,000 hours in the courtroom, and our firm has tried more than a dozen jury trials in Cascade, Phillips, Meagher and Yellowstone Counties.
- Appellate experience. The Montana Supreme Court reinstated a $168,500 jury verdict for our client (Voegel v. Salsbery, 2023 MT 137). The Boland Aarab appellate record reaches back to 1977.
- Federal court experience. More than 40 cases in the U.S. District Court for the District of Montana over nine years; Samir Aarab has argued twice before the Ninth Circuit.
- You work with the lawyers. Caitlin Boland Aarab and Samir Aarab handle your case themselves.
We also handle construction defect cases in Bozeman and appeals from Bozeman cases. See our Bozeman personal injury page for more.
Frequently Asked Questions
My Bozeman lawyer missed a deadline in my injury case. Do I have a malpractice claim? Possibly. You would need to show the lawyer fell below the standard of care and that your injury case would have succeeded, and what it was worth.
My property purchase near Bozeman closed without the access easement I was promised. Could that be malpractice? It could be, if a reasonably careful lawyer would have secured or flagged the easement. Damages usually turn on what the property is worth without it.
A lawyer mishandled my water rights claim in the Water Court. What can I do? Protect any open Water Court deadline first. Then have an independent lawyer review the file; the malpractice question is what a careful lawyer would have done and what the error cost.
Should I file a complaint with the Office of Disciplinary Counsel instead? You can do both, but a grievance does not compensate you. Only a civil malpractice claim can recover your losses, and its deadline keeps running while a grievance is reviewed.
How long do I have to sue a lawyer in Montana? Three years from when you discovered or should have discovered the error, but never more than ten years from the error itself (§ 27-2-206, MCA).
Contact Boland Aarab PLLP for a free consultation at (406) 315-3737.
Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. Reading it does not create an attorney-client relationship.
