Kasowitz, Benson & Torres is a New York law firm founded in 1993. It employs 350 lawyers and maintains offices in several states. The firm focuses on product liability

litigation - A lawsuit is a proceeding by a party or parties against another in the civil court of law. The archaic term "suit in law" is found in only a small number of laws still in effect today. The term "lawsuit" is used in reference to a civil actio ...

, corporate, family and employment law, as well as

intellectual property Intellectual property (IP) is a category of property that includes intangible creations of the human intellect. There are many types of intellectual property, and some countries recognize more than others. The best-known types are patents, cop ...

, bankruptcy and

creditors' rights A creditor or lender is a party (e.g., person, organization, company, or government) that has a claim on the services of a second party. It is a person or institution to whom money is owed. The first party, in general, has provided some property ...

. The firm's notable clients have included

Donald Trump Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021. Trump graduated from the Wharton School of the University of Pe ...

Robert De Niro Robert Anthony De Niro Jr. ( , ; born August 17, 1943) is an American actor. Known for his collaborations with Martin Scorsese, he is considered to be one of the best actors of his generation. De Niro is the recipient of various accolades ...

Celanese Celanese Corporation, formerly known as Hoechst Celanese, is an American technology and specialty materials company headquartered in Irving, Texas. A Fortune 500 corporation, the company is the world’s leading producer of acetic acid, produc ...

ArvinMeritor Meritor, Inc. is an American corporation headquartered in Troy, Michigan, which manufactures automobile components for military suppliers, trucks, and trailers. Meritor is a Fortune 500 company. In 1997, Rockwell International spun off its aut ...

Liggett Group Liggett Group ( ), formerly known as Liggett & Myers Tobacco Company, is the fourth largest tobacco company in the United States. Its headquarters are located in Durham, North Carolina, though its manufacturing facility is 30 miles to the west in ...

Enron Enron Corporation was an American energy, commodities, and services company based in Houston, Texas. It was founded by Kenneth Lay in 1985 as a merger between Lay's Houston Natural Gas and InterNorth, both relatively small regional companies. ...

WorldCom MCI, Inc. (subsequently Worldcom and MCI WorldCom) was a telecommunications company. For a time, it was the second largest long-distance telephone company in the United States, after AT&T. Worldcom grew largely by acquiring other telecommunic ...

and

Mia Farrow Maria de Lourdes Villiers "Mia" Farrow ( ; born February 9, 1945) is an American actress. She first gained notice for her role as Allison MacKenzie in the television soap opera '' Peyton Place'' and gained further recognition for her subsequent ...

History

Founding

The firm was founded as Kasowitz, Hoff, Benson & Torres in 1993 when

Marc Kasowitz Marc Elliot Kasowitz (; born June 28, 1952) is an American trial lawyer and partner of the New York-based law firm Kasowitz Benson Torres, which he co-founded in 1993. He has represented companies such as TPG, Douglas Elliman Realty, Teva Pharmac ...

left the

Mayer Brown Mayer Brown is a global white-shoe law firm, headquartered in Chicago, Illinois, United States. It has offices in 27 cities across the Americas, Asia, Europe, and the Middle East, with its largest offices being in Chicago, Washington, D.C., New Y ...

law firm with 18 other lawyers and two clients. David M. Friedman was added as a partner in May 1995, and William Bruce Hoff, Jr. left in November.

Expansion

The firm began in New York City with 18 lawyers and after 6 months expanded to include a Houston branch office. Friedman joined the firm in 1993 or 1994 and opened its bankruptcy practice. In 1996 several new lawyers joined the firm to begin its employment and matrimonial practices. It opened a New Jersey office in 1997, Atlanta in 2001 and in 2003 the firm opened a San Francisco office while former assistant

district attorney In the United States, a district attorney (DA), county attorney, state's attorney, prosecuting attorney, commonwealth's attorney, or state attorney is the chief prosecutor and/or chief law enforcement officer representing a U.S. state in a l ...

Leslie Crocker Snyder Leslie Crocker Snyder (born 1942) is an Americans, American lawyer and former judge, most notable for her challenge of Robert Morgenthau in the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party primary election, primary for the Manhattan Distri ...

, joined the office in New York. By 2004 the firm had increased to 160 lawyers and included an additional office in Atlanta. The firm opened its Miami, Florida office in 2006 and expanded its San Francisco, California office in 2007 by merging with the seven lawyer firm, Topel & Goodman. The 2005 launch of the intellectual property arm of the company led to several personnel changes with various key lawyers arriving and departing. This included Peter J. Toren who left the intellectual property department in the spring of 2007. In 2009 the firm hired Marcos Daniel Jimenez, former U.S. attorney for the Southern District of Florida, to lead its Miami, Florida officeRaymond, Nate (September 13, 2013).
Kasowitz Holds Power Close As He Grows Firm, Lures Business
. ''

New York Law Journal The ''New York Law Journal'', founded in 1888, is a legal periodical covering the legal profession in New York, United States. Background The newspaper, published Monday through Friday, provides daily coverage of civil and criminal cases from ...

''. Accessed June 27, 2014. and added insurance recovery litigation to its practice. In January 2010 the company added Robin Cohen and her insurance team from the firm, Dickstein Shapiro. In November 2012 the firm opened an additional office in Silicon Valley. They opened a Los Angeles, California office in May 2013 led by partners that were lured away from Jenner & Block. In June, former U.S. Senator,

Joe Lieberman Joseph Isadore Lieberman (; born February 24, 1942) is an American politician, lobbyist, and attorney who served as a United States Senate, United States senator from Connecticut from 1989 to 2013. A former member of the Democratic Party (Uni ...

, joined the firm as Senior Counsel and his former Senate Chief of Staff, Clarine Nardi Riddle launched a Government Affairs branch of the company in Washington D.C. In October, two senior litigation attorneys from

NBC Universal The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American English-language commercial broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a division of Comcast, its headquarters are l ...

joined the firm's Los Angeles office to begin an entertainment litigation practice. In 2014, following the resolution of several large cases, Kasowitz, Benson, Torres & Friedman laid off approximately 30 of its 350 attorneys. In 2014, Kasowitz, Benson, Torres & Friedman was ranked as the 119th largest firm in the United States by

Law360 Law360 is a subscription-based, legal news service based in New York City. It is operated by Portfolio Media, Inc., a subsidiary of LexisNexisSabroski, Suzxanne (May 1, 2012) LexisNexis goes 360, ''Onliline'' and delivers breaking news and analys ...

. In June, the firm was awarded the Chambers USA 2014 Award for Excellence.

Notable clients and cases

In 2003 the firm successfully opposed a chemical company called Celanese and won an asbestos lawsuit involving the auto parts supplier, ArvinMeritor. They also overturned a $799 million punitive damages award levied against the Liggett cigarette company. In 2004 the company received the "largest toxic tort settlement in U.S. history" in a case involving one of

Monsanto The Monsanto Company () was an American agrochemical and agricultural biotechnology corporation founded in 1901 and headquartered in Creve Coeur, Missouri. Monsanto's best known product is Roundup, a glyphosate-based herbicide, developed in th ...

's company plants in Alabama. By 2005 the firm had participated in the bankruptcy cases of Enron, WorldCom,

Global Crossing Global Crossing was a telecommunications company that provided computer networking services and operated a tier 1 carrier. It maintained a large backbone network and offered peering, virtual private networks, leased lines, audio and video confer ...

and

Adelphia Communications Adelphia Communications Corporation was an American cable television company with headquarters in Coudersport, Pennsylvania. It was founded in 1952 by brothers Gus and John Rigas after the pair purchased a cable television franchise for US$300. C ...

and the matrimonial proceedings for Robert De Niro,

Donna Hanover Donna Hanover (born Donna Ann Kofnovec; February 15, 1950) is an American journalist, radio and television personality, television producer, and actress, who appears on CUNY TV in New York City. From 1994 through 2001 she was First Lady of New Yo ...

and Mia Farrow. The firm has represented

since 2001. In January 2006, the firm filed a defamation lawsuit (dismissed in 2009) on behalf of Donald Trump against the author and publisher of '' TrumpNation: The Art of Being the Donald''. In 2010 the firm's clients included

Fortress Investment Group Fortress Investment Group is an American investment management firm based in New York City. Fortress was founded as a private equity firm in 1998 by Wes Edens, Rob Kauffman, and Randal Nardone. When Fortress launched on the NYSE in February 200 ...

MBIA MBIA Inc. is an American financial services company. It was founded in 1973 as the Municipal Bond Insurance Association. It is headquartered in Purchase, New York, and as of January 1, 2015 had approximately 180 employees. MBIA is the largest bo ...

and Fairfax Financial Holdings Limited. In 2016, the firm represented Harold Peerenboom of Toronto in an extended legal fight with his seasonal

Palm Beach, Florida Palm Beach is an incorporated town in Palm Beach County, Florida. Located on a barrier island in east-central Palm Beach County, the town is separated from several nearby cities including West Palm Beach and Lake Worth Beach by the Intracoas ...

, neighbor, businessman

Isaac Perlmutter Isaac "Ike" Perlmutter ( he, יצחק "אייק" פרלמוטר; born December 1, 1942) is an Israeli-American billionairehttps://www.forbes.com/profile/isaac-perlmutter businessman and financier. He is the chairman and former CEO of Marvel Ente ...

. In 2017, the firm had recently added the Russian

Sberbank PJSC Sberbank (russian: Сбербанк, initially a contraction of russian: сберегательный банк, translit=sberegatelnyy bank, lit=savings bank, link=no) is a Russian majority state-owned banking and financial services compan ...

"in a case that accused it of conspiring to take over a Russian granite company".

Administration

The firm's main administration consists of the partners, Marc Kasowitz, Daniel Benson, Hector Torres and David Friedman and its executive committee consists of Kasowitz, Benson and Torres. The company's average per partner profit was $2.9 million in 2004 and $2.1 million in 2009. According to a 2004 article in

American Lawyer ''The American Lawyer'' is a monthly legal magazine and website published by ALM Media. The periodical and its parent company, ALM (then American Lawyer Media), were founded in 1979 by Steven Brill. In contrast, a 2014 a report by American Lawyer ranked the firms cultural diversity as 59th out of the 223 firms they evaluated.

Controversy

In September 2007 the firm was dismissed by its client, Biovail Corporation after a Southern District Judge found Biovail Corp. had used legal documents in violation of a protection order. The law firm denied knowledge of the protective order and was later rehired by Biovail. In December 2007, one of the firm's partners, Jeremy Pitcock, was fired for "extremely inappropriate personal conduct." Pitcock sued the firm for wrongful firing and defamation and the firm countered with a suit claiming Pitcock sexually harassed 12 female employees. A panel of the Appellate Division, dismissed both suits. A former associate filed a lawsuit against the firm in August 2011 alleging negligent misrepresentation, breach of contract and wrongful termination. The suit's 2012 dismissal was upheld upon appeal. In October 2018, the firm was at the center of a fiery exchange between Senator

Kamala Harris Kamala Devi Harris ( ; born October 20, 1964) is an American politician and attorney who is the 49th vice president of the United States. She is the first female vice president and the highest-ranking female official in U.S. history, as well ...

and then-US

Supreme Court A supreme court is the highest court within the hierarchy of courts in most legal jurisdictions. Other descriptions for such courts include court of last resort, apex court, and high (or final) court of appeal. Broadly speaking, the decisions of ...

nominee

Brett Kavanaugh Brett Michael Kavanaugh ( ; born February 12, 1965) is an American lawyer and jurist serving as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. He was nominated by President Donald Trump on July 9, 2018, and has served since Oc ...

during his Senate hearing. Harris questioned Kavanaugh on whether he had spoken to any individuals employed at the firm about the ongoing

Mueller investigation The Mueller special counsel investigation was an investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections, links between associates of Donald Trump and Russian officials, and possible obstruction of justice by Trump and his ...

, which at the time President

Trump Trump most commonly refers to: * Donald Trump (born 1946), 45th president of the United States (2017–2021) * Trump (card games), any playing card given an ad-hoc high rank Trump may also refer to: Businesses and organizations * Donald J. T ...

was a personal client of the firm. It ultimately resulted in an unclear answer from Kavanaugh with lawmakers in the chamber struck at partisan odds over the appropriateness of the posed question.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kasowitz, Benson, Torres and Friedman Law firms established in 1993 Law firms based in New York City