National Trial Practice Team

JORDEN BURT's National Trial Practice Team regularly acts as lead counsel in complex and high exposure litigation matters for the largest and most sophisticated financial services companies in the world. The Team's lawyers have served as lead counsel in significant litigation matters in nearly every state. In class action litigation from California to New York, to Multidistrict litigation across the country, to billion dollar bad faith and other punitive damage claims in some of the nation's most notorious jurisdictions, JORDEN BURT's National Trial Practice Team has defended and assisted its clients in managing some of the most difficult litigation matters faced by the financial services industry.

JORDEN BURT trial lawyers have tried hundreds of cases to verdict throughout the country in state and federal trial courts and have extensive experience defending class action claims, multi-jurisdictional (MDL) litigation, mass plaintiff cases involving hundreds, or thousands, of claimants, bad faith and other punitive damage claims, and other high stakes litigation often involving proceedings in multiple federal and state court venues. JORDEN BURT trial lawyers have acted as lead counsel and national coordinating counsel in numerous multi-state matters involving a wide variety of claims and products, including cases alleging breach of contract, bad faith, consumer protection, and fraud claims, and cases involving health insurance, life insurance, annuities, property insurance, credit and other specialty insurance. These matters often involve multi-state regulatory issues. JORDEN BURT trial lawyers have also assisted clients in managing and defending hundreds of individual class action "opt out" cases. JORDEN BURT trial lawyers are often retained to take over the defense of difficult cases as they near trial.

Litigation Areas of Concentration

The National Trial Practice Team represents clients spanning JORDEN BURT's core Industry Groups, including Life Insurance, Health Care, Banking and Consumer Finance, Securities, Mutual Funds and Investment Advisers, Reinsurance, and Property and Casualty. Sophisticated businesses in these and other industries seek out JORDEN BURT's services when looking for the highest quality trial counsel to help defend and manage serious litigation matters.

Recent Trials

On October 12, 2009, a jury in federal court in Minnesota returned a verdict in favor of Jorden Burt's life insurance company client in a class action lawsuit where Plaintiffs were seeking damages in excess of $2 billion for a nationwide class of over 341,000 annuity policyowners based on alleged misrepresentations in annuity marketing materials. Plaintiffs subsequently moved for an injunction, seeking to require JORDEN BURT's client to change its marketing materials, disclosures and sales practices with respect to certain types of annuities, and seeking in excess of $14 million in attorneys' fees and costs. The Court denied Plaintiffs' post-trial motions.

In another class action matter, Jorden Burt obtained a directed verdict on behalf of a large Florida property and casualty insurer during a bench trial. Plaintiffs were condominium unit owners who claimed a right to sue the insurer for additional insurance proceeds under a purported assignment from the condominium association. JORDEN BURT was retained as co-counsel two years into the case and shortly before a class was certified. JORDEN BURT lawyers obtained a directed verdict and complete victory at trial in Florida state court.

Our Services

JORDEN BURT's National Trial Practice Team litigates in these and other areas:

• National and state class action litigation and related "opt-out" cases
• Federal Multidistrict Litigation
• "Mass" actions in state courts
• Market conduct and sales practice litigation
• Consumer fraud litigation
• High stakes punitive damage and bad faith litigation
• RICO litigation
• Securities litigation
• Insurance product litigation, including life, health, investment, and property and casualty products
• Insurance coverage litigation, including life, health, and property and casualty coverages
• Reinsurance arbitration, securities, and commercial arbitrations
• ERISA and retirement plan litigation
• Agent/broker litigation
• Labor and employment litigation
• Defense of consumer claims under Federal and State consumer protection laws including TILA, FDCPA, FCRA, FCBA
• Complex commercial tort litigation
• Creditors' rights, bankruptcy litigation, and loan workouts
• Intellectual property disputes, including patent, trademark, domain name, copyright, trade secret, and right of publicity litigation and arbitration
• Technology contract litigation
• Internet and e-commerce disputes, including digital defamation and product disparagement claims
• First amendment and other constitutional litigation
• Defamation, libel, and false advertising claims
• Environmental litigation
• Antitrust litigation
• Tax litigation

Parallel civil, regulatory, and criminal proceedings

Because of JORDEN BURT's extensive regulatory and securities expertise in insurance and financial products, lawyers in the National Trial Practice Team are often retained to help defend and manage multi-dimensional litigation involving parallel civil and regulatory proceedings, market conduct examinations, and criminal investigations or proceedings in multiple states. JORDEN BURT's white collar criminal defense lawyers participate jointly with civil litigators when potential criminal issues are present.

Arbitration

The National Trial Practice Team has litigated large dollar reinsurance disputes, FINRA and NASD securities matters, commercial disputes, contract claims, agency disputes, and consumer fraud claims. The Team includes experts on the Federal Arbitration Act and substantive arbitration law, including the enforcement of arbitration agreements, class-wide arbitration waivers, the enforcement and vacatur of arbitration awards, and special rules affecting arbitration provisions in insurance contracts. Some Team members serve as arbitrators in major cases, and have served in such capacity in over 100 matters. Team lawyers have also been retained to draft arbitration provisions for complex agreements, as well as arbitration endorsements for filing with state insurance regulators.

Litigation risk analysis and business practice reviews

Because of their familiarity with the litigation strategies and theories of liability employed by the plaintiff's bar, JORDEN BURT litigators are often called upon to assist corporate counsel and company management in analyzing litigation risks and evaluating litigation exposure. National Trial Practice Team members have prepared litigation exposure reports and undertaken internal investigations for company management, often proposing preventive or remedial measures and solutions for minimizing or eliminating litigation risk.

Organization

Comprised of over 65 litigators and paralegal professionals, JORDEN BURT's National Trial Practice Team includes lawyers who are nationally recognized leaders in their fields, including experts on trial strategy, electronic discovery, litigation privacy issues, privilege issues, ethics, and trial technology. The Team employs a peer review trial planning system for major trials and actively trains and develops the trial skills of its younger lawyers. The Team is organized to provide the highest caliber legal services available in today's global economy. Joined together by the latest technologies and database sharing, the Team's lawyers in each office collaborate and meet regularly to discuss litigation trends, decisional law affecting the firm's core client industries, and cutting edge defense strategies.

Relevant Experience

JORDEN BURT's experience in high stakes litigation on behalf of our financial services clients in state and federal courts across the country is, we believe, unparalleled. A few examples of our experience in various states illustrate the national scope of our litigation practice:

• Alabama - JORDEN BURT has a long history of defending financial services clients in the State of Alabama. Since the early 1990s, the National Trial Practice Team has defended over 300 class and individual fraud lawsuits in Alabama, and has litigated a dozen cases in the Alabama Supreme Court. We were lead counsel in several landmark Alabama Supreme Court cases, including the Walters case which put an end to "conditional" or so-called "drive-by" class certifications, and the Crawford case which upheld the insurance industry's right to enforce arbitration clauses in Alabama policies pursuant to the Federal Arbitration Act.

• Arkansas - JORDEN BURT has served as lead defense counsel in both class actions and individual lawsuits in the Western and Eastern Districts of Arkansas, and in the Arkansas state court system. JORDEN BURT defeated a national class action in the Circuit Court of Saline County, Arkansas, and a state-wide class action in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas. JORDEN BURT has acted as national coordinating counsel in connection with coverage and bad faith litigation involving health insurance in multiple Arkansas courts.

• California - JORDEN BURT regularly defends individual and class action lawsuits in California, including consumer fraud claims, securities fraud, RICO, ERISA violations, § 17200 claims, breach of contract, and bad faith claims. JORDEN BURT was the first firm to successfully remove state law claims involving variable contract sales under SLUSA in the Northern District of California. We have defended class action cases in every federal district in California.

• Colorado - JORDEN BURT lawyers have served as lead counsel in class action and individual lawsuits in both Colorado state and federal courts, as well as in Colorado-based FINRA arbitration proceedings. We have litigated cases involving variable annuity sales, bad faith, health insurance rescission, scrivener's errors in life insurance contracts, ERISA and COLI issues, and claims brought under Colorado's Consumer Protection Act, the federal and Colorado RICO statutes, and myriad common law theories.

• Connecticut - With our Northeast office based in Simsbury, Connecticut, JORDEN BURT lawyers have successfully litigated and tried over a hundred cases throughout the Connecticut state and federal court systems, and throughout New England. National Trial Practice Team members have clerked for several judges in Connecticut at the State Appellate and Supreme Courts and in the Federal District Court.

• Delaware - JORDEN BURT has litigated at every level in the Delaware court system, from the trial courts through the State Supreme Court. The firm was selected to defend AIG Life in Delaware state court against claims by Wal Mart Stores seeking in excess of $100 million of damages arising out of the purchase of corporate owned life insurance products.

• District of Columbia - JORDEN BURT's National office is located in Washington, D.C. where Trial Practice Team members appear regularly before the trial and appellate courts as well as administrative agencies. JORDEN BURT lawyers have done significant pro bono work in the District of Columbia and surrounding jurisdictions, including representing clients in adoption trials, veterans' benefits disputes, and domestic violence cases.

• Florida - JORDEN BURT's Southeast office is based in Florida and as a result the firm has extensive trial and litigation experience in complex matters throughout the State of Florida and surrounding states. We have successfully defended class and individual lawsuits in every significant state and federal court in Florida. National Trial Practice Team members have clerked for several judges in Florida at the Federal District Court and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. JORDEN BURT's Florida lawyers have done important pro bono work, including veterans' benefits disputes, domestic violence cases, and award-winning work with child guardianship matters.

• Georgia - Members of JORDEN BURT's National Trial Practice Team have served as lead defense counsel in Georgia federal and state courts. JORDEN BURT has defended class actions in Muskogee County and Bibb County, Georgia. The firm has also obtained approval of class action settlements in both state and federal courts. In the Middle District of Georgia, JORDEN BURT litigators settled a national class action, and seven years later successfully enjoined a group of Mississippi plaintiffs from collaterally attacking the terms of the prior class settlement.

• Hawaii - National Trial Practice Team lawyers have served as lead counsel in individual annuity litigation in federal and state courts in Hawaii.

• Idaho - JORDEN BURT lawyers achieved summary judgment at an early stage of the proceedings for one of our financial services clients in defense of an alleged investment contract fraud in Idaho state court and successfully defended an appeal of that ruling in the Idaho Court of Appeals.

• Illinois - JORDEN BURT litigators have defended individual and class action cases and have litigated arbitration issues under the Federal Arbitration Act in federal and state courts in Illinois, including Madison County, Illinois, the state appellate courts, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit. In the Northern District of Illinois, Jorden Burt successfully moved to dismiss a putative nationwide class action alleging claims of fraud, conversion, unjust enrichment, and violations of the Illinois Consumer Fraud Act relating to the issuance of lender-placed hazard insurance.

• Indiana - In a case involving contract and negligence claims and ERISA issues arising out of an investment contract, we obtained dismissal of the claim and judgment against plaintiffs for $260,000 of attorneys' fees and costs.

• Kentucky - JORDEN BURT has significant experience defending, on behalf of its financial services clients, putative class actions, bad faith claims, and other complex cases in Kentucky, including municipal premium tax litigation, and litigation related to supplemental cancer insurance policies.

• Louisiana - National Trial Practice Team lawyers have served as lead counsel in class actions and individual bad faith lawsuits in federal and state courts in Louisiana.

• Maryland - Due to its proximity to the firm's Washington, D.C. office, several members of the National Trial Practice Team are members of the Maryland Bar (which grants reciprocal privileges to members of both Bars) and have tried and litigated numerous cases in the Maryland state and federal courts.

• Massachusetts - JORDEN BURT lawyers successfully defended a major life insurance company in a one-week jury trial in Massachusetts state court in a case involving thirteen common law and statutory causes of action, including fraud and misrepresentation, in connection with the sale of a $12 million life insurance policy to a trust. JORDEN BURT trial lawyers convinced the Suffolk County (Boston) jury to return a complete defense verdict in favor of the insurer, and the trial court later ruled for the insurer on plaintiff's sole remaining claim for unfair and deceptive practices under the Massachusetts Consumer Protection Act.

• Michigan - National Trial Practice Team members have clerked for several federal judges in Michigan, and the chair of the firm's Class Action Practice Team is a member of the Michigan Bar. JORDEN BURT has defeated multiple national class actions in Michigan federal court. Trial Team members have also successfully litigated individual claims in state and federal courts involving diverse insurance and employee benefit plan claims.

• Minnesota - JORDEN BURT trial lawyers recently obtained a jury verdict in federal court in Minnesota in favor of its life insurer client, where plaintiffs were seeking a damage award in excess of $2 billion for a nationwide class of over 341,000 annuity policyowners, and defeated plaintiffs' post-trial attempt to obtain an injunction and attorneys' fees and costs in excess of $14 million. JORDEN BURT has also litigated a series of 11 class actions against one of our clients, consolidated by the MDL panel, and defeated class action certification motions and obtained verdicts or summary judgment on all class representative claims, later affirmed in three different decisions by the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals.

• Mississippi - Among national law firms, JORDEN BURT has unmatched experience defending the financial services industry in the State of Mississippi. We have served as lead counsel in "mass" actions involving thousands of plaintiffs, and we have defended against virtually every conceivable contract, statutory, and tort theory. JORDEN BURT managed one of the few successful jury trials in Claiborne County, Mississippi, obtaining a defense verdict for a holding company defendant and limiting plaintiffs' multimillion dollar punitive damage claim to $25,000. The firm later obtained a complete reversal of the verdict before the Mississippi Supreme Court in Wells v. Fidelity Financial Services, Inc. JORDEN BURT was lead counsel in two seminal Mississippi Supreme Court cases dealing with important procedural issues: American Bankers Ins. Co. v. Alexander (challenging "mass" joinder of 1,371 plaintiffs on due process grounds), and American Bankers Ins. Co. v. Booth (rejecting State Chancery Court's authority to entertain "equitable" class actions). We also removed to federal court and defeated on summary judgment a series of four related cases demanding $3.9 billion of compensatory and punitive damages based on the alleged fraudulent sale of life insurance policies. JORDEN BURT, as national coordinating counsel, has litigated class and individual claims alleging bad faith denial and reduction in health insurance benefits in the Mississippi courts, as well as claims involving alleged racial discrimination in the sale of insurance products.

• Missouri - National Trial Practice Team members have litigated numerous lawsuits and have won dispositive motions in federal and state courts across the State of Missouri. JORDEN BURT has prepared several cases for trial in the St. Louis area. JORDEN BURT has also acted as lead counsel in the defense of ERISA class action claims against life and health insurance companies, and has successfully defeated individual claims by owners of fixed and variable insurance products.

• New Hampshire - JORDEN BURT has litigated in state and federal courts in New Hampshire and defeated class certification in a putative multistate class action in federal court.

• New York and New Jersey - JORDEN BURT has extensive trial and litigation experience throughout the New York and New Jersey state and federal court systems. Several of our lawyers are admitted to practice in New York and New Jersey, and we have defended multiple class actions in New York and New Jersey, including cases in state court and every federal district court in both states.

• North Carolina - For almost 10 years, JORDEN BURT served as lead defense counsel in complex securities fraud litigation involving more than 15 separate actions consolidated in the federal district court in Raleigh, North Carolina alleging fraud in the issuance of over $300 million in mortgage backed bonds. In addition to successfully resolving these claims, in part through defense verdicts, summary judgments, and negotiated settlements, JORDEN BURT trial lawyers recovered cross-claim money judgments. JORDEN BURT trial lawyers litigated and obtained a favorable global settlement of some 35 related suits alleging unfair or deceptive trade practices claims involving the sales of annuities in North Carolina federal and state courts.

• North Dakota - In federal district court in Bismarck, North Dakota, National Trial Practice Team lawyers persuaded the court to dissolve an ex parte TRO and refuse a preliminary injunction sought against our life insurance company client and its broker-dealer.

• Oklahoma - JORDEN BURT has litigated a number of class actions and individual bad faith insurance coverage cases in Oklahoma, including cases in the Western, Eastern, and Northern Districts of Oklahoma, and has acted as national coordinating counsel for litigation alleging bad faith denial of health insurance policy benefits in the Oklahoma courts.

• Pennsylvania - JORDEN BURT has extensive experience litigating in the Western and Eastern Districts of Pennsylvania, including serving as lead counsel in MDL proceedings located in Philadelphia, defending multiple class actions in Pittsburgh, and defeating class certification in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.

• Rhode Island - JORDEN BURT obtained a jury verdict in one Rhode Island case on nine of ten claims against our financial services client for alleged non-disclosure in connection with sale and administration of an investment product. On appeal to the Rhode Island Supreme Court, the defense verdict was upheld and the jury verdict for plaintiff on one claim reversed, resulting in a complete victory.

• South Carolina - JORDEN BURT has defended numerous cases in South Carolina including class action cases in both state and federal courts. We defeated class certification in a case involving claims of racial discrimination in the sale of industrial life insurance policies to a proposed class of 1.4 million individuals, and we successfully defended the certification ruling on appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. JORDEN BURT, as national coordinating counsel, has litigated claims alleging bad faith denial of health insurance policy benefits in the South Carolina courts.

• Tennessee - JORDEN BURT served as lead trial counsel for the former U.S. affiliates of Fortis in a four week jury trial in Tennessee state court in a complex multimillion dollar contract dispute involving the marketing of customer appreciation insurance products through most of the nation's largest banks. JORDEN BURT trial lawyers obtained a jury verdict of $70.7 million on contract, tort, and statutory claims. JORDEN BURT has also defended class action lawsuits in both Tennessee federal and state courts. JORDEN BURT has acted as national coordinating counsel for litigation in Tennessee alleging bad faith denial of health insurance policy benefits in Tennessee courts.

• Texas - JORDEN BURT lawyers have served as lead counsel in class action and multidistrict litigation proceedings, as well as individual lawsuits, in both Texas state and federal courts, as well as in connection with various state regulatory investigations and proceedings. We have litigated cases in Texas involving a wide range of subject matters, including ERISA and COLI issues, asbestos liability, "juvenile smoker" pricing claims, and "vanishing premium" sales of life insurance policies.

• West Virginia - JORDEN BURT has acted as lead counsel in defending numerous class action cases, mass-party actions, and multimillion dollar bad faith punitive damage claims in West Virginia.

• Wisconsin - JORDEN BURT has litigated in Wisconsin state and federal courts. JORDEN BURT served as lead defense counsel in a national class action litigated in the Circuit Court of Waupaca County, Wisconsin, and the Eastern District of Wisconsin, and defended an action for breach of a telecommunications contract filed in the Milwaukee Division of the Wisconsin federal court.

Additional information on JORDEN BURT's trial and litigation experience in particular jurisdictions is available upon request.