Was it Mark Twain who said that if you represent yourself, you have a fool for a client?  Perhaps Abraham Lincoln?  No matter…The Appellate Division implicitly said so today, and dismissed a legal malpractice and Judiciary Law § 487 claim made by a lawyer who, they implied, ought to have known better than to say he was satisfied with his attorney’s work.

Katz v Essner  2016 NY Slip Op 01268  Decided on February 23, 2016  Appellate Division, First Department  held “Even if defendants’ alleged acts or omissions rose to the level of negligence, plaintiff’s allegations in support of his legal malpractice claim and Judiciary Law claims remain conclusory, speculative and contradicted by the documentary evidence submitted on the motion to dismiss (see Schloss v Steinberg, 100 AD3d 476 [1st Dept 2012]). Plaintiff failed to show that he was actually injured by defendants’ alleged neglect, or meet the “case within a case” requirement, demonstrating that “but for” defendants’ conduct he would have obtained a better settlement (see Warshaw Burstein Cohen Schlesinger & Kuh, LLP v Longmire, 106 AD3d 536 [1st Dept 2013], lv dismissed 21 NY3d 1059 [2013] [internal quotation marks omitted]).

Furthermore, in response to questions from defendant Essner, plaintiff stated on the record of the stipulation of settlement that he was satisfied with the services that defendants provided. Under the circumstances presented, including that plaintiff is an attorney, the motion court properly dismissed the complaint (see Harvey v Greenberg, 82 AD3d 683 [1st Dept 2011]).”