Lori B. Leskin serves as co-chair of the firm’s Consumer Products Practice Group. She is valued by her clients for her ability to successfully assess, strategize, and implement unique solutions to their unique problems.
Ms. Leskin has over 30 years of experience representing consumer product and pharmaceutical companies as national, strategic and trial counsel in mass and class action litigation across the country. She handles all aspects of litigation strategy for complex nationwide and multidistrict litigations involving a variety of products, including successfully defending consumer fraud and other class actions on behalf of clients such as Hain Celestial, Avon, and Coty in the Southern District of New York and other venues throughout the country, and representing Bayer Corporation and Pfizer Inc. as national counsel in several on-going product liability litigations.
In addition to her work in mass actions and class actions, Ms. Leskin has represented death row inmates in challenges to convictions and sentences, including the commuted death sentence of Virginia inmate Percy Levar Walton to life in prison without parole on the grounds that he was mentally incompetent to understand his situation. For her work with death row inmates, Ms. Leskin was one of four firm recipients of the 2008 Thurgood Marshall Award for Capital Representation from the Association of the Bar of the City of New York's Committee on Capital Punishment.
Experience
- Pfizer, as national counsel in defending against nationwide claims that its talc was contaminated with asbestos.
- Bayer, as lead counsel in MDL alleging that its fluoroquinolone antibiotics cause peripheral neuropathy and aortic aneurysm/dissection. In re: Fluoroquinolone Products Liability Litigation (D. Minn.)
- Strength of Nature, as lead counsel in MDL and related state court actions alleging that use of hair relaxer products cause uterine and other cancers. In re: Hair Relaxer Marketing, Sales Practice and Product Liability Litigation (N.D. IL)
- Dollar Tree and Family Dollar, as lead counsel in MDL alleging that prenatal use of its acetaminophen-containing products causes autism and ADHD in children. In re Acetaminophen - ASD-ADHD Products Liability Litigation (S.D.N.Y.)
- Pfizer, as lead and national counsel in nationwide litigation alleging its prescription product, Viagra®, causes various injuries, including heart attack, ischemic optic neuropathy and melanoma.
Perspectives
Recognition
Product Liability Litigation—Defendants (2009-2023)
“Lawyers of the Year”—Mass Tort Litigation/Class Actions—Defendants (2022)
"Life Sciences Star"—Non-IP Litigation (2012–2016)
Credentials
Education
- J.D., Rutgers Law School, 1992, highest honors, Order of the Coif, Anthony Englebrecht Prize
- B.A., American University, 1988, magna cum laude, University honors with high distinction, Phi Kappa Phi
Admissions
- New York
- New Jersey
- District of Columbia
- U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit
- U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit
- U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
- Supreme Court of New Jersey
- U.S. District Court, Eastern District of New York
- U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York
- U.S. District Court, District of New Jersey