A global business firm, Willkie Farr & Gallagher has been steadily increasing its litigation profile in both market share and in a literal headcount and geographic footprint sense. “I would have no hesitation sending anyone to Willkie,” insists a peer. “They are a firm on the rise.” While its core strength in the US has historically been New York – and remains so – the firm has branched out and developed other domestic locations as well. It opened a Chicago office in 2020, officially planting its flag on the Midwest legal landscape, continued developing its DC resources, and has doubled down on its expansion in California, where it now has three offices (Palo Alto, San Francisco, and Los Angeles.) “The biggest disrupter in the LA market recently has been Willkie Farr,” quips a peer in an observation on the firm’s build-out of that office. “I feel like anything that’s not nailed down, they’re trying to take!”
Willkie’s bet on California has paid dividends; the firm has attracted star partners in each office. In Los Angeles, the office’s managing partner
Alex Weingarten is a peer favorite. “Alex was at Venable before moving to Willkie,” states a peer, who goes on to confide, “I was trying to get him to come here! He’s a terrific litigator who has some high-profile entertainment clients. [He’s] Unbelievable!” Weingarten for nearly a decade has represented the co-trustee of a family trust who was embroiled in a long-running, multi-generational family dispute concerning who was behind a conspiracy to steal tens of millions from the trust, built by the Chinese immigrant grandparents through a successful real estate venture. After reaching a settlement in 2018, in which the trustee’s mother essentially agreed to forfeit $30 million due to the likelihood of her being behind the conspiracy, the mother then changed her mind and spent four years attempting to void the settlement. In March 2022, Weingarten triumphed in convincing the California Court of Appeal to enforce the settlement. A peer also notes that multi-faceted commercial litigator Simona Agnolucci “left [revered San Francisco litigation boutique] Keker [Van Nest & Peters] to open Willkie’s San Francisco office. She’s a player.” Working on a team with DC’s Michael Gottlieb and Mark Stancil, Agnolucci secured a decisive victory in the US District Court for the District of South Carolina in obtaining a dismissal of nationwide class claims brought against Navy Federal Credit Union, a federally chartered, member-owned, not-for-profit credit union serving the military, veterans, and their families. A federal class action was first filed in the Southern District of California, alleging on behalf of a nationwide class that Navy Federal breached its agreement with certain of its customers by charging debit card users a small fee for certain overseas transactions. After Willkie filed Navy Federal’s motion to dismiss, the plaintiff voluntarily dismissed her complaint. Almost in parallel, another nearly identical lawsuit was filed by different plaintiffs in the District of South Carolina, which met with a similar voluntary dismissal. Willkie’s hot streak in recruiting continues; this past year the firm lured
Koren “Kori” Bell, a celebrated white-collar crime-focused partner formerly with local boutique Larson, to its bench. A peer also insists, “Let’s talk about [San Francisco-based IP-focused future star]
Barrington Dyer – he’s great!”
Willkie’s insurance practice has made a substantial rise as well. A peer advises, “Look into Christopher St. Jeanos – ask around about him! He’s a stand-up lawyer, and I think he’s only in his mid-40s! My litmus test when it comes to dealing with counsel is ‘Are you just a paper tiger?’ And Chris is not – he’s the real deal.” Another testifies that St. Jeanos is “doing AIG work and all the Marsh work, and he is at the upper echelon in terms of quality.” St. Jeanos and long-time insurance star Mitchell Auslander (both based in the New York office) obtained a significant victory for AIG in litigation concerning McKesson, one of the leading distributors of prescription opioids in the US and a target of the sweeping litigation against all entities in the chain alleged to have contributed to the national epidemic. McKesson, which recently agreed to contribute $7.4 billion to settle thousands of opioid lawsuits brought by government bodies across the country, sought coverage from AIG for its defense costs, judgments, and settlements incurred in the opioid lawsuits. At issue in the litigation are AIG policies with $375 million in total policy limits. The Willkie duo scored when the Northern District of California held, for the first time, that a wholesale drug distributor’s conduct in distributing opioids was not an “accident,” and therefore not covered under commercial general liability policies issued by AIG. The same pair also logged victory for this same client in similar claims brought by Purdue Pharma.
New York-based securities partners Todd Cosenza and Tariq Mundiya are representing Curo in a shareholder-derivative suit regarding the company’s plans to transition Canadian borrowers from one type of loan to another. The derivative litigation is follow-on litigation from a 10b-5 case in the District of Kansas that has settled. Individually, Cosenza recently achieved a significant win, obtaining dismissal of a derivative action against the independent directors of Wells Fargo in a case arising out of alleged failures by Wells Fargo and its board to comply with several consent orders issued by banking and other federal regulators in the aftermath of the financial services company’s high-profile 2016 customer account fraud. Mundiya defended Resideo Technologies against claims arising from Honeywell’s 2018 spin-off of Resideo and the earnings guidance provided in 2019, upon which Resideo’s stock price fell precipitously, leading to class-action litigation in Minnesota and derivative litigation in Delaware. “Tariq is very good on the M&A side of things,” confirms a peer.
The chairman of the Chicago office, Craig Martin, joined Willkie in 2020 from Jenner & Block and has continued to build out the firm’s Windy City office. Martin’s practice encompasses a wide spectrum of commercial litigation, quasi-white-collar work, intellectual property, and pro bono human rights issues. “Craig brought over a team from Jenner with him to Willkie and he’s been very successful.”
