Courts are loathe to apply Judiciary Law 487, and when they do, the Appellate Division often reverses.  Here,Lifeline Funding, LLC v Ripka  2014 NY Slip Op 01106 [114 AD3d 507]
February 18, 2014  Appellate Division, First Department serves as an example.  Plaintiff succeeded in obtaining a misdemeanor conviction for the common law violation of Judiciary Law 487 along with treble damages.  This is an unheard of accomplishment. Unheard of! 

So, the Appellate Division reverses.  "This Court finds, however, that the motion court erred in finding that defendant violated Judiciary Law § 487. Defendant did not engage in the "extreme pattern of legal delinquency" [*2]required to violate the statute (Gonzalez v Gordon, 233 AD2d 191, 191 [1st Dept 1996], lv denied 90 NY2d 802 [1997] [internal quotation marks omitted] [defendant attorney’s disbursement of $39,000 in escrow funds without plaintiff’s authority did not support an award of treble damages]; Wiggin v Gordon, 115 Misc 2d 1071, 1077 [Civil Ct, Queens County 1982] [defendant attorney who repeatedly told plaintiff he would pay taxes on the estate, never did so and then defaulted on the Judiciary Law § 487 proceedings brought against him engaged in "chronic, extreme pattern of legal delinquency"]). Although we do not condone defendant’s actions, his conduct does not constitute "an extreme case" of attorney misconduct (Wiggin, 115 Misc 2d at 1071)."