Doe, Doreen

Paula Reichenstein joined Jones Day after graduating from law school. Following a year as a member of the Firm's new lawyers group and several years in the Firm's trial practice, Paula began working primarily on product liability cases, officially joining the product liability practice in 2000.

Paula worked extensively on the Texas and Oklahoma Attorneys General tobacco litigation on behalf of R.J. Reynolds. Although she was involved in multiple issues in those lawsuits, she principally focused on the extensive discovery effort that was necessary (including taking depositions of individual Medicaid recipients in Oklahoma) and briefing the complex issues in those cases, including the appropriate use of statistics as proof.

Paula has worked on the public entity firearms litigation for Colt's Manufacturing Company from the initiation of that wave of litigation in 1998. She has been involved in numerous cases around the country, including participation in the two-month-long trial of the NAACP action before United States District Judge Jack Weinstein in spring 2003. Paula has also worked extensively on the appellate side of the firearms cases, including briefing before the Second Circuit in connection with the City of New York firearms case.

In addition, Paula has been deeply involved in the ongoing vinyl chloride litigation on behalf of Occidental Chemical Company, Bridgestone/Firestone, and others for several years. Her work in those cases has included responsibility for discovery responses, discovery motions, dispositive motions, deposition of opposing experts, and preparation of expert and fact witnesses for deposition and trial. Given the large number of both defendants and cases in the vinyl chloride litigation, Paula's work in the vinyl chloride cases has also involved significant coordination with other national and local counsel.

More recently, Paula has been involved in defending Parker Hannifin in several cases alleging that various airline disasters were caused by a part manufactured by Parker. Paula's work on behalf of Parker has included handling a complex settlement of claims of well over 100 plaintiffs in the Silk Air case and extensive briefing on motions in the Flash Air case currently pending in France.

Paula also recently has been involved in the new wave of global warming litigation on behalf of Xcel Energy. In a case brought in the Southern District of Mississippi claiming that Xcel and other energy companies are liable for damage caused by Hurricane Katrina, Paula was heavily involved in briefing a motion to dismiss on behalf of Xcel. Following dismissal of the case by the trial court and an appeal by the plaintiffs, Paula worked on the briefing before the Fifth Circuit. The appeal is pending. Paula is currently working on a new global warming case on behalf of Xcel in which a small, Alaskan village threatened by coastal erosion has sued Xcel and other energy companies arguing that the defendants' contributions to global warming have caused or contributed to the erosion of the land on which the village is situated, forcing the village to move. The case is ongoing in federal court in California.

Paula is also currently working on the team representing Mattel in connection with Mattel's voluntary recalls of certain toys that were pulled from the market due to lead in excess of regulatory standards and allegedly containing magnets that improperly became displaced. Class action cases were initiated in 13 different jurisdictions, asserting noninjury product liability claims and were consolidated in the Northern District of California by the MDL panel.

Paula is coauthor of the article, "The Use of Complex Statistical Proofs in the New Wave of Public Tort Cases," 2d Ed., II (2)(f), Product Liability Advisory Counsel Compensatory Damages Deskbook (April 1999).