Court of Appeals of New York

In a case in which an ex-husband sought to reform or have set aside a divorce settlement agreement based on a claim of mutual mistake pertaining to an investment account maintained by Bernard Madoff, the Supreme Court's order of dismissal is reinstated, where the complaint failed to adequately state a cause of action based on mutual mistake, since: 1) the settlement agreement did not mention the Madoff account, much less evince an intent to divide the account in equal or other proportionate shares; and 2) the mutual mistake did not exist at the time the agreement was executed, since the husband was able to withdraw funds from the account prior to its collapse to partially pay his distributive payment to wife.

Appellate Information

• Decided 04/03/2012
• Published 04/03/2012

Judges

• Graffeo

Court

• Court of Appeals of New York

Counsel

• For Appellant:
  
• Richard D. Emery, Allan J. Arffa