Pariser, Brian W.

Mark A. J. Fassold was born in Rantoul, Illinois. Upon graduating from H. M. King High School, Kingsville, Texas, Mark enlisted into the Texas Army National Guard and later attended Officer Candidate School graduating first in his class as Distinguish Honor Graduate. In 1994 (as the first of his immediate and extended family to attend college), Mark earned his Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science from Texas A&I University with a perfect 4.0 grade point average earning a Woodrow Wilson Fellowship to attend Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government. In 1996, he earned a Master in Public Policy degree and a scholarship to attend Harvard Law School. In 1999, Mr. Fassold obtained his Juris Doctoris degree from Harvard Law School.

During his five years at Harvard, Mr. Fassold qualified and served as a “statistical expert witness” whose expert opinion was adopted by the court in G.I. Forum v. Texas Education Agency, 87 F.Supp.2d 667 (W.D. Tex. 2000) over the opinions of professors from the University of Texas and the University of Michigan. In that case, Mr. Fassold performed regression analysis establishing that Texas’ high school graduation exam had a disparate impact on ethnic minorities controlling for factors such as socioeconomic status, school quality, curriculum and numerous other factors.

Upon graduation, from 1999 to 2001, Mr. Fassold served as a Briefing Attorney to the Honorable Hayden W. Head, Jr., United States District Court, Southern District of Texas, Corpus Christi, Texas. While a Briefing Attorney, he was given permission to represent, pro bono, a family member who had been sued for negligence. During the trial of that case, his first, Mark obtained a unanimous verdict of no liability in favor of his client in what had been previously described by several attorneys as a sure loss for Mark’s client.

Since 2001, Mr. Fassold worked with the same group of attorneys first at Jenkens & Gilchrist and then Jackson Walker. In February 2008, Mark made partner at Jackson Walker. During his time at these firms, he prosecuted and/or defended hundreds of cases in the areas of complex business litigation, intellectual property litigation, and product liability litigation. As lead attorney, Mr. Fassold has tried and won jury verdicts in state and federal courts. Mark has a national practice and has represented clients before specialized courts such as those at the United States International Trade Commission.