Appellate

The Appellate Group practices in a wide variety of substantive law areas, including class action, commercial, constitutional, corporate fraud and misconduct, employment, product liability, railroad regulatory and tort litigation.

Clients choose our appellate lawyers to implement sophisticated post-trial and appellate strategies. In addition to appellate litigation arising from cases litigated by our trial lawyers, we represent clients in post-trial and appellate matters that have been litigated in the trial court by lawyers from other firms because we consistently produce persuasive, effective briefs and oral arguments.

Members of the Appellate practice work closely with our trial lawyers so that legal issues are preserved and dispositive pretrial and post-trial motions are properly briefed and argued. We form trial and appellate teams for large and complex cases so that potential litigation strategies are fully explored and the client’s interests are well protected.

Several of our appellate attorneys have appeared before the U.S. Supreme Court and have filed amici briefs for a number of clients. For example, one of our partners successfully argued the historic state sovereign immunity case, Federal Maritime Commission v. South Carolina State Ports Authority, 535 U.S. 743 (2002). Another partner successfully argued Intertanko v. Locke (consolidated for argument with United States v. Locke), 529 U.S. 89 (2000) for international shipping interests before the Supreme Court of the United States. This has become a lead case in maritime constitutional preemption issues. Having a Washington, D.C., office further enhances our ability to keep close watch on substantive law developments at the Court, while still observing judicial trends in state and federal jurisdictions throughout the country.