Jane Metcalf is a Partner in Patterson Belknap Webb & Tyler LLP’s Litigation department. She has extensive experience in class-action defense, competitor advertising disputes, and litigation involving FDA-regulated products. She also advises clients in internal investigations and in responding to inquiries from government agencies.
Ms. Metcalf routinely litigates consumer class actions on behalf of clients in the pharmaceutical, food and beverage, and tech sectors. She successfully argued the Second Circuit appeal of an order dismissing a class action complaint against a major beverage company, resulting in a critical precedent articulating the rigorous pleading standards applicable to claims under New York’s consumer protection laws. She also represented a client in a class action relating to its flagship product – ultimately persuading the Ninth Circuit to order dismissal of the case for lack of standing, and generating a critical precedent on that issue as well. Ms. Metcalf has defeated many class actions at the pleadings stage or an early summary judgment.
Ms. Metcalf also regularly represents clients in competitor false advertising suits. She has successfully defended companies in the telecommunications and consumer products spaces from Lanham Act competitor suits. She also successfully represented a household products company in a challenge to its competitor’s advertising, obtaining a favorable ruling on an innovative theory of falsity under the Lanham Act.
Ms. Metcalf also maintains a varied commercial litigation practice beyond the false advertising realm. Recently, she has represented a payments technology company in a qui tam action alleging violation of escheat law, a hedge fund in a FINRA arbitration arising from an employee’s termination, and a consumer products company in a breach of contract dispute.
Ms. Metcalf is active in pro bono efforts throughout the firm and the city. She is a supervisor of the State Central Register pro bono project, in which Firm attorneys represent low-income parents who have been placed, without due process, on a register of individuals suspected of child maltreatment – depriving them of important employment opportunities. She is a member of the New York County Lawyers Association Committee on Pro Bono.
Ms. Metcalf joined Patterson Belknap in 2012, after clerking for the Hon. Paul G. Gardephe of the U.S. District Court for the S.D.N.Y. and the Hon. Raymond J. Lohier, Jr. of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. She became a partner in 2019. She received her B.A., magna cum laude, from Yale University and J.D., magna cum laude, from the University of Michigan Law School.
Updated July 2023
