Legal malpractice claims, in contradistinction to all other professional negligence claims,  enjoy an extra layer of protection for the attorney. Not only must one find a departure from good practice, which proximately damaged the client, but (and only in legal malpractice) one must meet the “exacting standard” that but for the attorney’s negligence the outcome of the matter would have been substantially different.  This is big…very big, as we see in SS Marks LLC v Morrison Cohen LLP  2015 NY Slip Op 08090  Decided on November 10, 2015  Appellate Division, First Department.

“Plaintiff failed to show that defendants were negligent or that their alleged negligence was the proximate cause of the alleged damages (see Kaminsky v Herrick, Feinstein LLP, 59 AD3d 1, 9 [2008], lv denied 12 NY3d 715 [2009]). It did not, as is required in any legal malpractice case, establish that defendants “failed to exercise the ordinary reasonable skill and knowledge commonly possessed by a member of the legal profession [or] meet the exacting standard that but for the attorney’s negligence the outcome of the matter would have been substantially different” (id., internal quotation marks and citations omitted]). In particular, the documentary evidence refutes plaintiff’s claim that defendants failed to advise him of the existence and consequence of a subordination provision added to the lease at issue. Further, defendants’ failure to obtain a personal guaranty did not cause plaintiff any damages, as the documentary evidence shows that plaintiff assigned its rights to any guaranty to the lenders on the subject transaction.”