Seyfarth Shaw Establishes National Multi-Disciplinary Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX) Whistleblower Team

Contact:
Kevin Livingston, National Director of Public Relations
(212) 218-5272, klivingston@seyfarth.com

CHICAGO and BOSTON (November 15, 2010)—As whistleblower litigation continues to proliferate with the passage of the Dodd-Frank Act, Seyfarth Shaw LLP, one of America’s leading full-service law firms, announced today that it has established a national, multi-disciplinary Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX) Whistleblower team to assist clients in defending SOX whistleblower litigation and minimizing the risk of such claims through pre- and post-litigation counseling. The SOX Whistleblower team will work under the direction of Steven J. Pearlman, a partner in the Labor & Employment department in the firm’s Chicago office, and Christopher F. Robertson, a partner in the Litigation Department and member of the Securities & Financial Litigation practice group in the firm’s Boston office. The 50-plus member team is comprised of attorneys from the Litigation, Labor & Employment, Corporate & Finance, and Employee Benefits departments.

“Our SOX Whistleblower team is uniquely positioned to handle the most sensitive SOX whistleblower cases,” said Chicago’s Pearlman. “We achieve powerful synergies by capitalizing on the experience of our employment litigators, securities litigators, corporate compliance and transactional securities attorneys, and attorneys experienced in litigating claims before the Department of Labor (DOL) under myriad other whistleblower statutes.”

He continued, “Streamlining these sweet spots of Seyfarth’s national practices into a single team enables us to rapidly diagnose nuanced legal issues, architect multi-faceted strategies and effectively execute those strategies.”

Seyfarth already has had a profound impact on the landscape of SOX litigation. For example, the firm has prevailed before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit in Day v. Staples, Inc., one of the leading SOX whistleblower decisions protecting employers, is presently defending a range of high-profile SOX cases involving companies of all sizes and executives in federal courts and before the DOL's Office of Administrative Law Judges, has secured leading decisions before the DOL's Administrative Review Board (ARB) and has secured many dismissals from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA).

“Whistleblower litigation has grown and the stakes have gotten higher with the enactment of the Dodd-Frank legislation,” added Boston’s Robertson. “These cases often invade the C-Suite, garner unwanted media attention, threaten goodwill and may compromise operations. Our team is well-positioned to handle these cases with our unparalleled experience and expansive knowledge-base.”

In recognition of the firm’s dedication to defending management in this burgeoning area, the ARB has invited Seyfarth to serve as stakeholders in its rule-making and related procedures and to serve in an amicus capacity in significant litigation.

For more information on Seyfarth’s SOX Whistleblower team, please visit the team’s dedicated website to find relevant news, resources and thought leadership: www.seyfarth.com/SOX. 

Seyfarth Shaw has over 750 attorneys located in 10 offices throughout the United States, including: Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles, New York, Sacramento, San Francisco, and Washington D.C., as well as Brussels, Belgium. Seyfarth Shaw provides a broad range of legal services in the areas of labor and employment, employee benefits, litigation, corporate, and real estate. The firm’s practice reflects virtually every industry and segment of the country’s business and social fabric. Clients include over 300 of the Fortune 500 companies, financial institutions, newspapers and other media, hotels, health care organizations, airlines and railroads. The firm also represents a number of federal, state and local governmental and educational entities. For more information, please visit www.seyfarth.com or the following other sites: http://twitter.com/seyfarthshawLLP,
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