Benedene Cannata has been affiliated with The Flomenhaft Law Firm since 2010. She is in charge of the firm’s appeals, motion papers, and legal memoranda and has appellate experience in all four New York appellate divisions. She has vast experience in personal injury cases stemming from premises liability, construction law, motor-vehicle accidents, as well as medical and legal malpractice. The plaintiffs in many of these cases suffered catastrophic injury, such as traumatic brain injury, cerebral palsy, quadriplegia, and Complex Regional Pain Syndrome (CRPS) also known as Reflex Sympathetic Dystrophy (RSD).
Ms. Cannata is a dedicated member of the New York State Academy of Trial Lawyers. She has served on the Academy’s Board of Directors, and has written monthly reviews of appellate division decisions for both the First and Fourth Departments. In 2008, she became a Dean of the Academy and in that capacity has presented more than 35 Continuing Legal Education courses on various subjects relating to personal injury practice, including evidence, discovery. expert witnesses, appeals, and legal writing. Her course “Physicians and Their Records at Trial” has been presented more than sixteen times, including at the 2015 Court of Claims Justices conference in Lake Placid.
Her publications include the First and Second Editions of NEW YORK JUDGE REVIEWS (1997 James Publishing Company), an annotated reference book profiling over 200 New York State Supreme Court Justices. She authored a chapter on Motions In Limine for the upcoming New York State Bar Association treatise, PLAINTIFF’S PERSONAL INJURY ACTIONS IN NEW YORK. Her model motion in limine regarding the competency and scientific acceptability of biomechanical engineering testimony in motor-vehicle accident cases appears in LITIGATING MIST CASES, published by West Group. She also contributed to the ATLA (now AAJ) Motor Vehicle and Premises Liability Section newsletters. While in law school, Ms. Cannata worked on various scholarly publications as research assistant to E. Donald Shapiro, the Joseph Solomon Distinguished Professor of Law and Supernumerary Fellow of St. Cross College at Oxford University, and served as an articles editor for the Journal of Human Rights. Her article, The Widow and the Sperm: The Law of Post-Mortem Insemination, written with Professor Shapiro and published in the Cleveland-Marshall Journal of Law & Health, has been cited in over 75 scholarly publications, including law reviews and medical journals.
Ms. Cannata has presented Continuing Legal Education courses for the Monroe County Bar Association, the New York City Bar, and the New York State Bar Association. In November 2014 she moderated a panel entitled “The Admissibility of Neuroscientific Evidence in the Courtroom” as part of the Neuroscience in the Courtroom education course presented at Fordham Law School. She is a graduate of Colgate University and New York Law School.
Admission to Practice
New York
United States District Court: Southern District of New York
United States District Court: Eastern District of New York
Professional Associations and Organizations
Charter Member and Dean, New York State Academy of Trial Lawyers
New York State Trial Lawyers Association
New York State Bar Association
American Academy of Justice
Monroe County Bar Association (Litigation Section, Academy of Law)
Past Member, Nassau County Bar Association
Past Member, Medical Malpractice Committee of the Association of the Bar of the City of New York