Kearney, Daniel P.

In her thirty year legal career, Kathleen Kauffman has represented businesses large and small in suits raising the full range of commercial claims including breach of contract and fiduciary duty; fraud; violation of antitrust, securities, and intellectual property law; accountant liability; general estate and business torts. She has represented her clients on public policy issues before administrative agencies and Congress. Among other industries, her cases have involved telecommunications, soft drinks, banks, commodities trading, farm financial institutions, trade associations, railroads, software companies, heavy equipment manufacturers, accounting firms, banks, foundation trustees, bankruptcy trustees, the insurance industry, and pharmaceutical companies. Before bringing her skills to Ackerson Kauffman Fex, Ms. Kauffman practiced in three of the nation's most highly respected large law firms in Washington, Chicago and Los Angeles. She has represented clients in courts throughout the country and is licensed in the District of Columbia, Illinois and California.

Based on her reputation as a litigator, in 1993, Ms. Kauffman was recruited to head one of the nation's premier litigation consulting firms. In the seven years that Ms. Kauffman served as chief executive officer, the firm advised many of the nation's top litigators on strategies, tactics and risks in complex cases to be tried before a jury, and she was a central participant in developing litigation strategy. Many of Ms. Kauffman's cases were reported on the front pages of the national press. Ms. Kauffman brought her extensive experience advising the company's clients, including many law firms from the AmLaw 100 and corporations in the Fortune 50 to The Ackerson Group's litigation practice.

Recently, Ms. Kauffman has been one of the lead counsel on nationwide class actions in numerous state and federal courts involving fiber optic cable and land rights. She has represented plaintiffs in suits against the major telecommunications companies and utilities on behalf of classes of landowners whose land was used for the installation of fiber optic cable. Her clients in those cases involve individuals, farmers, ranchers and businesses, including Fortune 100 companies who are among some of the nation's largest landowners. She concluded and defended on appeal one of the largest and most creative class action settlements in recent years, involving claims against the telecommunications subsidiary of Norfolk Southern. The innovative business structure that has been created as part of that settlement gives the class members both cash and a new telecommunications company of their own including a percentage of the revenue from cable installed by the defendant on 1,500 miles of their property and ownership of telecommunications assets.

Ms. Kauffman was the law clerk to Judge John D. Butzner of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit in 1979-1980.

SIGNIFICANT CASES AND ACCOMPLISHMENTS

• Land Rights Class Actions
  • Class Counsel on Fisher v. Virginia Electric Power Company, which successfully settled claims on over 500 miles of electric right-of-way used for telecommunicating purposes
  • One of lead counsel on Uhl v. T-Cubed, which successfully settled claims of over 50,000 landowners to 2,500 miles of right-of-way for a percentage of T-Cubed's revenue and telecommunication assets
  • One of lead counsel on Sustainable Forest, Inc. v. Qwest
    One of lead counsel for objectors in Zografos v. Qwest
    Consulting Co-Counsel on more than fifty other currently pending class actions
• Antitrust
  • Counsel for former Bell System in antitrust suits brought by MCI and Sprint
  • Counsel for Mid-Atlantic Coca-Cola Bottling Company in antitrust action brought by Allegheny Pepsi-Cola Bottling Company
• Intellectual Property
  • Counsel for Smith in Smith v. Hughes (patent damages trial)
  • Counsel for Arthur Andersen in tax software copyright infringement trail
  • Counsel for Zenith in patent suit
• Securities Law and Fraud
  • Counsel for president of Penn Square Bank in actions arising from failure of the bank
  • Counsel for trustees of the Bradley Trust in litigation with beneficiary of trust over investment decisions
  • Counsel for partnerships created by Michael Milken at Drexel, Burnham in grand jury investigation following the Ivan Boesky scandal
• Accountant Liability
  • Lead Counsel for Japanese banks in suit against Peat Marwick
  • Counsel for United States and European banks in suit against Ernst & Young
• Government Regulation
  • Counsel for First South Production Credit Association in suit to defend loan regulations
  • Counsel to State Farm in administrative action to establish passive restraint regulation
  • Counsel to State Farm in administrative action to establish bumper standards
• General Business Litigation
  • Counsel for Bank of Tokyo in suit against Bank of America
    Counsel for numerous individuals and corporations on suits involving contracts, business torts and non-compete agreements.