NEW YORK CITY-Law firm Stroock & Stroock & Levan and its developer clients won a reprieve this week on Attorney General Andrew Cuomo’s bid to force the firm to release some $16 million from an escrow account for a 41-story luxury condominium project on the Hudson River in Manhattan.

Several condominium buyers at the Rushmore development who wanted their deposits back because of a one-digit typo made by a Stroock lawyer that altered a closing date in the project's offering documents were backed by the attorney general, who ordered the money released from escrow.

The developers on whose behalf Stroock was holding the money, Carlyle Realty Partners and Extell Development, retained Boies, Schiller & Flexner, which obtained a temporary restraining order on May 10 from Southern District Judge George Daniels. The judge then dissolved the order on May 18 and denied the developers’ motion for a preliminary injunction. But Richard N. Cohen of Friedberg Cohen Coleman & Pinkas, who represents some 32 plaintiffs, says Judge Richard Wesley of the US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit stayed Judge Daniels' decision pending review of the case by a three-judge panel.

The mistake in the offering documents that triggered the dispute said the buyers could get their deposits back if the first closing in the building did not occur by Sept. 1, 2008, when, in fact, the year was supposed to read 2009, according to Carlyle/Extell. Edward Normand of Boies Schiller has argued that the mistake was harmless and does not reflect the intent of the parties. Normand declined comment.

Mark Hamblett can be reached at [email protected].