OPINION AND ORDER Plaintiff Richard Farmer, proceeding pro se, brings this action against Defendants Karpf, Karpf & Cerrutti P.C. (“KKC”); Ari Risson Karpf; Amy Karpf; Jeremy M. Cerrutti; Christine E. Burke; and Adam Charles Lease (together, the “KKC Defendants”); as well as Defendants Terc Law Office, P.C. (“TLO”) and Miguel Angel Terc (together, the “Terc Defendants”). Plaintiff alleges an array of claims, including, inter alia, violations of various sections of New York’s Judiciary Law; New York’s laws relating to false advertising and deceptive practices; and federal mail fraud and wire fraud statutes. In sum and substance, Plaintiff alleges that Defendants, some of whom represented Plaintiff in a prior suit in this District before the Honorable George B. Daniels, defrauded Plaintiff and the district court as part of a scheme to secure attorney’s fees and an outsized proportion of a settlement award for themselves. Defendants now move, pursuant to Federal Rules of Civil Procedure 12(b)(1) and 12(b)(6), to dismiss Plaintiff’s claims for lack of subject matter jurisdiction and, in the alternative, for failure to state a claim. For the reasons set forth in the remainder of this Opinion, Defendants’ motions to dismiss are granted.1 BACKGROUND2 A. Factual Background On or about August 29, 2013, Plaintiff contacted the law offices of Defendant KKC, a law firm that is headquartered in Bensalem, Pennsylvania, but has offices in New York. (Compl. 18). Plaintiff spoke with Defendant Ari Risson Karpf, an attorney at the firm, about a potential suit Plaintiff wished to bring against his employer for wrongful retaliation and unpaid overtime wages. (Id.). Karpf assigned Defendant Adam Charles Lease, another attorney at the firm, to meet with Farmer at a location in Astoria, Queens, to discuss the case. (Id. at 19). Plaintiff met with Lease on August 30, 2013, and Lease referred to Plaintiff’s potential lawsuit as “a slam dunk.” (Id.). A few days after the meeting with Lease, Karpf forwarded to Plaintiff a retainer agreement with a contingency fee provision; Plaintiff executed the agreement and returned it to Karpf. (Id. at 20). On September 19, 2013, Lease filed a lawsuit on Plaintiff’s behalf in this District against Hyde Your Eyes Optical Inc. (“HYEO”), which lawsuit was assigned to Judge Daniels. (Compl. 21; Farmer v. Hyde Your Eyes Optical, Inc., No. 13 Civ. 6653 (GBD) (S.D.N.Y.), Dkt. #1).3 Lease informed Plaintiff that the lawsuit would be a long process, and that Plaintiff simply had to wait until the court scheduled a settlement conference for the parties to appear. (Compl. 21). Lease also told Plaintiff that he would not need to appear in court until that time. (Id.). In late December 2013, after having had no contact from his attorney, Plaintiff called KKC and spoke with Allison Forte, a paralegal at the firm. (Id. at 22). Plaintiff asked Forte if his case had been scheduled on Judge Daniels’s calendar, and Forte responded that nothing had yet been scheduled. (Id.). However, when Plaintiff walked into the courthouse for the Southern District of New York a few days later, he verified that his case had indeed been scheduled on the court’s calendar. (Id.).4 On January 23, 2014, Judge Daniels held an initial pretrial conference in Plaintiff’s case. (Compl. 23; see also 6653 Dkt. #17). Defendant Miguel Angel Terc, an attorney at TLO, appeared on behalf of Plaintiff, while Paul Patrick Rooney, an attorney at Ellenoff Grossman & Schole, LLP, appeared on behalf of the defendants in that case. (Compl.
23, 25). Plaintiff alleges that he had never met with Terc, or engaged Terc’s services prior to this conference, or had any knowledge of Terc or TLO (id. at 26), although Terc had entered a Notice of Appearance as Plaintiff’s counsel on October 7, 2013 (6653 Dkt. #10). At the January 23, 2014 conference, Terc and Rooney requested that Judge Daniels refer the parties to mediation. (Compl., Ex. A). Plaintiff alleges that this was done as part of a “scheme of deceit,” whereby counsel for both parties in the case before Judge Daniels sought to keep the actual parties out of the courtroom. (Id. at 27). This was done, Plaintiff contends, so that counsel could devise a settlement that would result in high awards and fees for the attorneys, and comparatively little award for Plaintiff. (Id.). On March 27, 2014, after having not seen Lease since August 2013, Plaintiff arrived for a scheduled settlement conference in his case. (Compl. 31).5 Before the conference began, Lease called Plaintiff out of the conference room and told Plaintiff that if he (Plaintiff) did not accept a settlement by the end of the day, KKC would no longer represent him. (Id.). At the conference, Lease calculated Plaintiff’s damages as approximately $1,365,000. (Id. at 32). Opposing counsel offered a settlement amount of $20,000, but Plaintiff refused it. (Id. at 34). Indeed, Plaintiff refused to settle for any amount, given his belief that the entire settlement conference was rigged. (Id. at 33). When the conference ended, Lease confronted Plaintiff in the elevator, screaming, “It’s all your fault!” (Compl. 34). Plaintiff contacted Karpf later that evening to report on Lease’s behavior, but Karpf defended Lease. (Id. At 37). On April 2, 2014, Defendants jointly filed a motion to withdraw as counsel. (6653 Dkt. #29-30). Defendants claimed that Plaintiff had treated them “in a very demeaning, hostile[,] and disrespectful manner,” and that they did not believe that there was “any existing relationship that would allow litigation to proceed effectively.” (6653 Dkt. #30). Plaintiff, however, alleges that the motion was filed in retaliation — both for Plaintiff’s reporting of Lease’s misconduct and for his refusal to accept the settlement offer on March 27, 2014. (Compl. 38). On April 8, 2014, Judge Daniels granted Defendants’ motion to withdraw (6653 Dkt. #31), and on April 9, 2014, Plaintiff confirmed his intention to proceed pro se (6653 Dkt. #33). On April 17, 2014, Judge Daniels referred the case to Magistrate Judge James L. Cott for general pretrial supervision. (6653 Dkt. #36). On May 14, 2014, Plaintiff and counsel for the defendants appeared before Judge Cott to discuss a number of issues that the defendants had raised in a prior letter to the court, as well as the discovery schedule and the possibility of renewed settlement discussions. (Compl. 39; 6653 Dkt. #42). Plaintiff alleges that when Judge Cott asked Rooney whether he had previously appeared on behalf of the defendants before Judge Daniels, Rooney responded that he had not. (Compl. 40). Plaintiff alleges that Rooney lied to Judge Cott because he wished to cover up his involvement in collaborating with Defendants on their scheme to defraud the district court and Plaintiff. (Id. at
