Nationally Recognized Litigator to Lead 100-Lawyer Practice
NEW YORK, NY – September 8, 2008 – LAWFUEL – Patterson Belknap is pleased to announce that partner Steven A. Zalesin is the new Chair of the firm’s Litigation Department, effective immediately. Mr. Zalesin is taking on this role following the appointment of former group head Paul G. Gardephe to the bench of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York.
A nationally-recognized trial attorney, Mr. Zalesin focuses on both intellectual property and complex commercial matters. He has successfully tried numerous cases and argued appeals in state and federal courts throughout the United States. Mr. Zalesin, 48, serves as lead counsel to Fortune 50 clients in the pharmaceutical, biotech, music and computer software industries in cases involving patent and copyright issues. In recent years, he has achieved victories on behalf of the world’s largest software company and the two largest record labels in a variety of intellectual property disputes.
Recognized as a leader in the false advertising field, for more than 20 years Mr. Zalesin has represented the manufacturers of several of the nation’s best-selling nonprescription medicines in a series of landmark false advertising cases that have helped to define the law in this area, and to preserve and grow product markets. For the past several years, he has represented the manufacturer of the leading no-calorie sweetener in a succession of trade dress and false advertising disputes. In 2004 and again this year, he won injunctions preventing competitors from selling no-calorie sweeteners in packaging confusingly similar to our client’s product. In 2006, Mr. Zalesin obtained a string of rulings in six states denying certification of putative classes of consumers who alleged that they had been deceived by advertising for our client’s product.
Mr. Zalesin is recognized in Chambers USA as a top-tier practitioner in the area of Advertising and is included in Best Lawyers in America 2008. He is a member of the editorial board of Advertising Compliance Service.
Mr. Zalesin has been a member of Patterson Belknap’s Litigation Department since joining the firm in 1989. Today, the Department includes over 100 lawyers engaged in high-stakes matters on behalf of clients ranging from Fortune 50 corporations to hedge funds to not-for-profit organizations. The firm’s attorneys are active in areas including complex commercial disputes, intellectual property, subprime mortgage and credit crisis fallout, law firm defense and white collar defense and investigations.
Patterson Belknap is a New York City based law firm with nearly 200 lawyers. The firm is one of only four firms to be ranked in the Top 10 of The American Lawyer’s “A-List” of elite firms every year since the list’s inception. Patterson Belknap delivers a full range of services across approximately 20 practice groups in both litigation and commercial law. For more information, please visit www.pbwt.com.
