Perkins Coie Announces 2019 Partner Class
Perkins Coie announced that 27 counsel and senior counsel have been promoted to partner. The new partner class of 2019 includes:
• Sunita Bali (San Francisco)
• Pam Berkowitz (Chicago)
• Emily Bushaw (Seattle)
• Elvira Castillo (Seattle)
• Harvey Chen (Palo Alto)
• Ulrike Connelly (Seattle)
• Bradley Cosman (Phoenix)
• Chelsea Curfman (Denver)
• Lara Dueppen (Los Angeles)
• Sambo Dul (Phoenix)
• Deborah Dunn (Boise)
• Imri Eisner (New York)
• Danielle Fortier (Denver)
• Sarah Gillstrom (Anchorage)
• David Gold (Chicago)
• Patrick McKeever (San Diego)
• Megan Morrissey (Chicago)
• Joshua Nelson (Boise)
• Melissa Oka (Chicago)
• David Perez (Seattle)
• Lynwood Reinhardt (Dallas)
• Matthew Rojas (Phoenix)
• Holly Simpkins (Seattle)
• Victoria Smith (Palo Alto)
• Dana Syracuse (New York)
• John (Randy) Tyler (Seattle)
• Kyle Wood (Dallas)
“The 2019 partner class includes a group of attorneys who continuously demonstrate an unwavering commitment to client service and exemplify the core values of Perkins Coie’s culture,” said John Devaney, Firmwide Managing Partner. “In recognition of their substantive contributions to client work and superior leadership and legal skills, we are honored to welcome them into the partnership.”
In a release, the firm profiled all the new partners:
Perkins Coie 2019 Partner Class
Sunita Bali is a member of Perkins Coie’s Litigation practice. She primarily represents technology clients in privacy and consumer class action disputes, as well as other complex commercial litigation matters in California state and federal courts. Sunita defends companies against claims brought under California’s Unfair Competition Law and False Advertising Law and claims for breach of contract, fraud, tortious interference, invasion of privacy, trade secret misappropriation and copyright infringement. She has also handled all aspects of civil litigation, including dispositive motion practice, discovery, opposing motions for class certification, dispute resolution and trial preparation.
Pam E. Berkowitz (Chicago) is a member of Perkins Coie’s Trust & Estate Planning practice. Her practice focuses on estate planning, transfer taxation, and trust and estate administration and probate, including the creation of business and estate plans and the management and protection of wealth, while minimizing estate, gift and generation-skipping taxes. Pam has also advised clients, family office professionals, and other financial professionals on the creation, funding, and maintenance of trusts and business entities.
Emily A. Bushaw (Seattle) is a member of Perkins Coie’s Labor and Employment practice. Emily’s practice focuses on employment litigation, arbitration and counseling. Her experience includes defense of discrimination, harassment and retaliation claims, wage-and-hour class actions, and whistleblower, trade secret and non-competition claims. She also provides counsel to clients regarding human resources issues, discipline and discharge matters, employee handbooks and policies, wage-and-hour law, employee classification issues, and arbitration and separation agreements.
Elvira Castillo (Seattle) is a member of Perkins Coie’s Litigation practice. Elvira handles complex civil litigation matters concerning antitrust, unfair competition, securities regulations and internal investigations, specifically matters arising under the federal Sherman Act, Clayton Act, Federal Trade Commission Act, Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, and numerous state consumer protection acts. She has represented both plaintiffs and defendants in state and federal courts across the country in a variety of industries, including film and entertainment, aviation, food and financial institutions.
Harvey Chen (Palo Alto) is a member of Perkins Coie’s Intellectual Property practice. He focuses on all aspects of IP matters with an emphasis on patent procurement, strategy planning and counseling, post-grant validity contentions (including inter partes reviews), and litigation support for electrical and mechanical arts. Harvey also provides trademark consultation and registration services to his clients. As a native Mandarin speaker, Harvey is experienced in helping Asian companies navigate through various kinds of legal issues in the United States.
Ulrike (Rike) Connelly (Seattle) is a member of Perkins Coie’s Litigation practice. She represents clients throughout all stages of civil litigation, from advising on the need to bring litigation through the appeal. Her experience covers complex business litigation with extensive electronic discovery, trade secret disputes, franchise issues and estate litigation. Rike also regularly represents clients before the Washington State Liquor and Cannabis Board to advocate for new or different regulations, including challenging the agency’s actions in court under the state Administrative Procedure Act.
Bradley A. Cosman (Phoenix) is a member of Perkins Coie’s Corporate and Bankruptcy & Restructuring practices. A former corporate turnaround advisor with FTI Consulting and a Certified Insolvency and Restructuring Advisor (CIRA), Bradley counsels clients on multiple aspects of corporate restructuring, including legal, accounting, operational, strategic and financial issues. He represents constituents throughout the capital stack, including debtors, senior and junior secured lenders, unsecured creditors, principals and guarantors. Bradley has particular experience with privately held and middle-market companies.
Chelsea W. Curfman (Denver) is a member of Perkins Coie’s White Collar & Investigations practice. She conducts internal investigations for clients facing issues involving bribery, corruption, accounting and securities fraud, and other workplace misconduct. Chelsea identifies and assesses potential violations of laws such as the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and other anti-bribery and anti-corruption laws, whether in the context of investigating whistleblower allegations, responding to a subpoena from regulators like the Department of Justice or Securities and Exchange Commission, or assessing risk in a potential acquisition target or supply chain partner. She also helps clients design and implement corporate compliance programs.
Dr. Lara J. Dueppen (Los Angeles) is a member of Perkins Coie’s Intellectual Property practice. She has experience in a wide range of intellectual property matters, including patent procurement and global patent portfolio management, due diligence and freedom to operate, inter partes review proceedings and patent litigation. She has represented clients in matters covering a broad range of technologies, with a primary focus on biotechnology.
Sambo (Bo) Dul (Phoenix) is a member of Perkins Coie’s Political Law group. She focuses her practice on political litigation, representing voters, campaigns, political committees, activists and others with an interest in the political process in actions in state and federal courts across the country. Bo has significant experience in voting rights matters, including challenging state and local restrictions that make it more difficult for eligible voters to participate in the democratic process. She also assists clients with compliance and internal investigations in matters involving the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and international anti-corruption laws.
Deborah V. Dunn (Boise) is a member of Perkins Coie’s Trust & Estate Planning practice. Deborah focuses her practice on multigenerational estate planning and administration for high net worth families, family offices and owners of closely held businesses. This includes drafting sophisticated estate plans, representing clients in complex estate and gift tax audits, and advising executors in will contests and disputes with beneficiaries. She also represents trustees with respect to trust and estate administration, as well as beneficiaries with respect to rights and claims.
Imri Eisner (New York) is a member of Perkins Coie’s Emerging Companies & Venture Capital practice. He represents venture-backed companies and venture and private equity funds in a variety of securities and debt issuances, mergers and acquisitions, and corporate governance matters. Imri’s experience includes buy- and sell-side M&A, purchaser and issuer side equity financings, and origination, acquisition and distress debt financings.
Danielle L. Fortier (Denver) is a member of Perkins Coie’s Corporate practice. She represents strategic and financial buyers in structuring, negotiating and documenting a wide range of public and private company transactions, including mergers, acquisitions, divestitures, financings and restructurings. Danielle advises clients in a number of industries and is experienced with transactions in the software, technology, and consumer and agricultural products sectors.
Sarah C. Gillstrom (Anchorage) is a member of Perkins Coie’s Litigation practice. Sarah’s practice focuses on construction law and commercial litigation in both federal and state courts. In addition to representing clients in breach-of-contract litigation, she has experience assisting clients—including owners, contractors, and design professionals—in construction disputes. Sarah also drafts and negotiates construction agreements. In addition, Sarah represents clients in real estate transactions and litigation.
David J. Gold (Chicago) is a member of Perkins Coie’s Corporate practice. David’s practice concentrates on financial restructuring, bankruptcy, general commercial litigation, distressed real estate and workouts. He represents debtors, creditors and trustees in bankruptcy proceedings and has significant experience in Chapter 11 reorganizations, Chapter 7 liquidations and hotel industry restructurings.
Patrick McKeever (San Diego) is a member of Perkins Coie’s Patent Litigation practice. He handles complex patent disputes in district courts around the country and before the U.S. Patent Office’s Patent Trial and Appeal Board. Patrick’s cases have involved a wide variety software and computer-related technologies. He represents a mix of FORTUNE 500 and emerging companies.
Megan G. Morrissey (Chicago) is a member of Perkins Coie’s Mergers & Acquisitions practice. Megan focuses her practice on corporate transactions with an emphasis on debt finance. She also advises various private equity funds in multimillion-dollar portfolio acquisitions and restructurings, and regularly negotiates and structures both secured and unsecured financing transactions. Megan represents private equity sponsors, portfolio companies, commercial lending institutions, and other private and public companies, as well as borrowers in matters involving senior, mezzanine and subordinated debt transactions; acquisition financings, loan workouts and restructuring; asset-based financings; first, second and split lien financings; structured loan participations; distressed debt and investment portfolio acquisitions. She is experienced with financings in the regulated fields of telecommunications, healthcare and technology.
Joshua M. Nelson (Boise) is a member of Perkins Coie’s Intellectual Property group. Joshua counsels clients in all aspects of patent portfolio management, including the preparation and prosecution of patent applications, patent licensing and litigation, and portfolio acquisitions and sales. He has represented clients in every stage of growth across a wide variety of industries, including semiconductor manufacturing and packaging, computer hardware, telecommunications, aerospace, medical device, software, and image and video processing.
Melissa J. Oka (Chicago) is a member of Perkins Coie’s Financial Transactions and Corporate Law practices. Melissa focuses on commercial finance transactions for public and closely held companies, banks and other financial institutions, and private equity funds. She also assists companies with the New Markets Tax Credit and Opportunity Zones, and with opportunities in the hotel and hospitality sector.
David A. Perez (Seattle) is a member of Perkins Coie’s Litigation practice. David practices complex commercial litigation with an emphasis on intellectual property, consumer protection, class actions, constitutional law, unfair competition and trial practice. He regularly works on trade secret disputes, counseling clients asserting trade secret misappropriation or defending against misappropriation claims. As part of his constitutional law practice, David regularly advises clients on First Amendment, communications, media, and internet-related matters, including as litigation counsel.
Lynwood E. Reinhardt (Dallas) is a member of Perkins Coie’s Corporate practice. He focuses his practice on corporate governance and transactions, representing clients in mergers and acquisitions, recapitalizations, joint ventures, investment fund formation, initial public offerings and large private placements. Lynwood has significant representative experience in the energy, healthcare and technology sectors.
Matthew L. Rojas (Phoenix) is a member of Perkins Coie’s Environment and Natural Resources and Energy Law practices. He counsels municipal and industrial clients on complex natural resource and environmental issues, including the development of natural resources and renewable energy on public lands and within Indian Country, the acquisition, transfer, and wheeling of surface and groundwater rights in the Southwest, and environmental permitting and compliance work for utility and infrastructure projects such as solar and wind farms, and power lines and pipelines on private, state and federal lands. Many of Matthew’s clients operate in the mining, utility and agricultural sectors.
Holly M. Simpkins (Seattle) is a member of Perkins Coie’s Intellectual Property Litigation practice. Holly represents both plaintiffs and defendants in trademark and copyright litigation throughout the United States. She also has extensive experience counseling clients on intellectual property and brand protection strategies, including securing, policing, investigating and enforcing her clients’ rights as well as investigating and removing from the market counterfeit and other unauthorized goods. In addition to federal court litigation, Holly regularly appears in matters before the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board.
Victoria Q. Smith (Palo Alto) is a member of Perkins Coie’s Patent Litigation practice. She focuses on litigating patent and other intellectual property rights in the telecommunications, biotech, electronics and software fields, including technology related to cellular devices, data encryption and compression, pharmaceuticals, email, mapping and enterprise software, and graphics software and chips. She handles all aspects of patent infringement cases, including e-discovery, invalidity and non-infringement defenses, fact and expert witness depositions, Markman hearings, summary judgment motions and trial.
Dana V. Syracuse (New York) is a member of Perkins Coie’s Technology Transactions & Privacy Law practice. Dana concentrates his practice in the blockchain, fintech, e-commerce and financial services sectors, working with clients on regulatory, business and product counseling, cyber and data security, and enforcement concerns. He works with a range of fintech and digital business clients on federal and state regulatory, compliance and enforcement matters; complex bank regulatory issues, including privacy, anti–money laundering; Bank Secrecy Act and Know-Your-Customer matters; consumer protection; and contract drafting and negotiations.
John (Randy) R. Tyler (Seattle) is a member of Perkins Coie’s Litigation and Privacy & Security practices. Randy concentrates his practice on privacy, security and free speech issues associated with electronic communications and activity. He represents communications providers with respect to digital search, seizure and disclosure issues, and has deep expertise on issues involving the Stored Communications Act, Wiretap Act, Pen Register Trap and Trace Act, Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act, All Writs Act, California Electronic Communications Privacy Act, and related state and local laws.
Kyle Wood (Dallas) is a member of Perkins Coie’s Technology Transactions & Privacy Law practice and the Blockchain Technology & Digital Currency industry group. Kyle advises technology clients, ranging from startups to FORTUNE 100 companies, on an array of technology transactions and privacy matters, with a specific emphasis on blockchain technology. Kyle works with clients in the telecommunications, information technology, internet, medical device, biotechnology and energy industries.
