Listen to this articleWhen three attorneys with Big Law backgrounds and personal and professional relationships spanning decades join together, the result is top-shelf representation with the personal attention all clients deserve but too often don’t receive. Below is our recent interview with Jerome (Jerry) Madden, Principal at Madden Law:
Q: What advantages does Madden Law have over its competitors?
A: Most large firms are made up of attorneys with loose, and sometimes even adversarial, ties to each other, in multiple cities throughout the United States and/or abroad. Practice groups within these firms come and go depending upon the profitability of the groups in any given period. Although the attorneys at Madden Law all have Big Law backgrounds, the firm is small by design and consists of three attorneys with personal and professional ties of over 30 years. I met Charlie Rowan in the early 1980s when we were both new litigation associates at an “Am Law 100” (i.e., “Big Law”) firm in Washington, D.C. We worked together on important cases then and have been close friends ever since. Charlie and Virginia Hoptman have been friends even longer. They met as classmates at the University of Virginia School of Law.
Because of our close personal and professional ties, we can uniquely approach the practice of law in a way that involves each of us in all phases of each matter, including deciding whether to accept an engagement, assessing litigation risk, developing overall strategy, drafting and editing briefs, preparing for oral argument, and pursuing settlement when appropriate. This approach is the best way to serve our clients. We are committed to cost-effective fee arrangements because of our collective experience in Big Law. In addition to Jerry and Charlies’ Big Law background, Virginia has been a partner at two well-respected law firms, including a firm ranked 111 (Am Law 200) in the nation by the American Lawyer. I have successfully litigated high-stakes trials and appeals at the Department of Justice and FDIC against Big Law counsel and witnessed the inefficiency of over staffing from the outside looking in. Charlie, as the Assistant General Counsel (AGC) for litigation at Unisys Corporation, a worldwide information-technology company, knows how important it is to manage outside counsel to avoid such inefficiencies. Because of the unavoidable pyramid structure of Big Law, cost inefficiency is almost inevitable. We favor a fixed-fee or hybrid-fixed fee approach that helps to more closely align our clients’ interests with those of the firm.
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Q: Who is your ideal client?
A: Our ideal clients are organizations whose in-house counsel or executive officers desire (i) a fresh look at a trial court decision, (ii) an in-depth assessment of litigation risks at the trial or appellate level, and/or (iii) a more cost-effective representation by outside counsel. We also want to be a go-to resource for litigation firms that focus primarily on trial-level work and who want to associate with a superb appellate shop that will work with them as a team to protect their clients’ interests. Madden Law does not compete with trial firms in fact-intensive civil cases; rather, we look forward to assisting trial counsel in briefing dispositive motions, preparing post-trial briefs including motions for reconsideration, or analyzing other complicated legal issues. However, the firm will represent clients at the trial levels in law-intensive cases, including cases involving financial regulations or suits against or by the United States or its agencies.
Q: You founded Beyond Conflict; tell us something more?
A: Tapping into their long association, Virginia and Charlie co-founded BeyondConflict LLC in 2015. BeyondConflict is an innovative firm that, as Charlie says, “helps organizations reframe conflict to uncover new value, strengthen important relationships and prevent future disputes.” As the Principal of Madden Law, I am delighted that Virginia and Charlie bring to Madden Law not only their significant talent and experience as lawyers, but also their specialized knowledge and roles as innovative leaders and thinkers in dispute prevention and alternative dispute resolution (“ADR”). Their association with Madden Law greatly enhances the breadth and depth of the services the firm can provide its clients.
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Q: What is the best thing about Madden Law that people might not know about?
A: I would say it is the trial and appellate credentials each of us brings to the firm. Virginia and Charlie graduated Phi Betta Kappa from top undergraduate schools, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Johns Hopkins University, respectively. They also both graduated near the top of their class at the University of Virginia School of Law, where Virginia was an editor of the UVA Law Review and Charlie served on the Moot Court Board. I graduated at the top of my class at the University of Dayton School of Law, where I was the Editor-in-Chief of the University of Dayton Law Review.
Together we have been law clerks to judges at each level of the federal and state court systems. Virginia was a law clerk for United States Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall and Chief Judge Collins J. Seitz of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit in Philadelphia. Charlie began his career as a law clerk to the Honorable Howard F. Corcoran, U.S. District Judge for the District of Columbia. I was a law clerk for Ohio Supreme Court Justice C. William O’Neill, also a former governor of Ohio, and, before that, Chief Judge Carl S. Kessler at the Ohio state trial level. In addition, each experience as civil litigators is distinct and complimentary. I spent most of my career as counsel of record in high-stakes or high-profile cases at the Department of Justice, Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, or the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, often litigating against parties represented by Big Law counsel. Virginia has been a partner at two well-respected law firms. After gaining first-chair trial and appellate experience at two major law firms, Charlie spent most of his career as AGC at Unisys where he was responsible for litigating and resolving a wide range of high-profile disputes not only in the United States but in the UK, Germany, Belgium, and Australia. Together, we understand the civil litigation landscape across a broad spectrum of subjects.
Although each of us has first-chair trial and appellate experience, Virginia and I have extensive appellate experience and expertise. For example, I have shouldered significant responsibility in well over 100 appeals and have conducted oral argument in thirty appeals, including appeals in all thirteen federal circuit courts of appeals. Where I have represented the United States or FDIC as the appellant, I have achieved a reversal rate 94%. The reversal rate in 2015 for all civil appeals in which the United States, a federal agency, or a federal official was a plaintiff or defendant was 4.2%, and the reversal rate for all civil cases that were not a prisoner petition of bankruptcy appeal was 14.2%. While at the Department of Justice and the FDIC, I also assisted the Office of the Solicitor General in drafting merits briefs and preparing for oral argument in four Supreme Court cases related to regulating financial institutions. In addition, I have prepared numerous draft petitions for certiorari or in opposition thereto.
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Q: What can we expect from you in the future?
A: I expect the firm to become a broadly respected “boutique” firm recognized for its innovative and cost-effective approach to appellate practice at the federal level and state courts. I also expect the firm over time will be recognized at the trial and appellate levels as having special expertise in financial-sector cases, including financial company regulation, complex procedural and jurisdictional matters in the federal courts, and suits against or by the federal government under the Administrative Procedure Act, the Federal Tort Claims Act and the Tucker Act (contract and Fifth Amendment cases).
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