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Mr. Benck is a dual US/Luxembourg citizen who graduated from Birmingham-Southern College (BA- Economics, 1990). He obtained his Juris Doctorate from the University of Alabama School of Law (JD, 1993).
Professionally, he serves as the Vice President, General Counsel and Assistant Secretary for Hibbett Sporting Goods, Inc. (Nasdaq: HIBB), a billion dollar, full line sporting goods distributor headquartered in Alabama with over 1,050 retail locations in approximately 36 US states, and nearly 10,000 employees.
Reporting directly to the CEO and the Board of Directors, he oversees the Legal Department and its staff of attorneys, Governmental Affairs, Economic and Competitive Intelligence, Enterprise Risk Management, Enterprise-wide Compliance, and serves as the Chief Privacy Officer (CIPP/US certified).
In addition to his role as chief legal officer for Hibbett, Mr. Benck serves in the following capacities:
Judge Araceli Martínez-Olguín began serving as a United States district judge for the Northern District of California in March 2023. Prior to her appointment to the federal bench, she was an impact litigator working for the National Immigration Law Center, from 2018 to 2023. Judge Martínez-Olguín served as the managing attorney at the Immigrants’ Rights Project at Community Legal Services in East Palo Alto from 2017 to 2018, and as an attorney for the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights from 2016 to 2017. She also worked at the ACLU’s Immigrants’ Rights Project and Women’s Rights Project from 2013 to 2015 and from 2006 to 2010, respectively. Judge Martínez-Olguín was a staff attorney for Legal Aid at Work (formerly Legal Aid Society – Employment Law Center) from 2010 to 2013.
Judge Martínez-Olguín received her A.B. from Princeton University’s School of Public and International Affairs in 1999 and her J.D. from the University of California, Berkeley School of Law in 2004. Following law school, she served as a law clerk to the Honorable David Briones of the United States District Court for the Western District of Texas from 2004 to 2006. Judge Martínez-Olguín is a Mexican immigrant and taught Spanish for Lawyers as an adjunct professor at Berkeley Law School in 2012, 2013 and 2016. She is also an elected member of the American Law Institute.
A relentless and principled advocate, Kenneth S. Byrd is a partner in Lieff Cabraser’s Nashville office and an experienced trial attorney who has obtained several large jury verdicts against major tobacco companies. He received the Tennessee Association for Justice’s 2015 Paladin Award for his successful litigation against cigarette manufacturers R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company, Philip Morris USA Inc., and Lorillard Tobacco Company in Florida federal courts. The Paladin Award is TAJ’s highest honor and is given to the state’s top trial lawyer of the year. His work in these cases included securing separate jury verdicts of $27 million and $41 million, both upheld on appeal.
Kenny represents clients in mass tort cases, defective product cases, and consumer fraud litigation. He represents consumers in class actions as well as injured individuals and families in personal injury and wrongful death cases nationwide. His leadership roles include appointments to the Plaintiffs’ Steering Committee and Early Vetting Subcommittee in In re 3M Combat Arms Earplug Liability Litigation, MDL 2885 (the largest MDL in U.S. history), and to the Plaintiffs’ Steering Committee in In re AME Church Employee Retirement Fund Litigation, MDL 3035.
Kenny is also a member of Lieff Cabraser’s Whistleblower/False Claims Act practice group, helping whistleblowers expose fraud and the misuse of government funds.
Consumer protection and defective products.
Boston College Law School, J.D., cum laude (2004)
Samford University, B.S. in Mathematics, minor in Journalism (1995), cum laude
Tennessee (2004)
U.S. Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit (2009)
U.S. District Court, District of Colorado (2019)
U.S. District Court, Northern District of Illinois (2016)
U.S. District Court, Eastern District of Michigan (2020)
U.S. District Court, Eastern District of Tennessee (2006)
U.S. District Court, Middle District of Tennessee (2005)
U.S. District Court, Western District of Tennessee (2007)
Faculty, “Texas Two Step. When Insurance is Gone and the Bankruptcy Court Is Not: Mass Torts in Crisis,” Mississippi Association for Justice Winter CLE Seminar (2022)
Speaker, “Mass Torts/Class Actions and Bankruptcy Issues,” Trial Lawyers of Mass Torts Inaugural Conference (2022)
Co-author, ABA Survey of Federal Circuit Court’s Class Action Decisions (2018)
American Bar Association
American Constitution Society, Nashville Chapter
Camp Ridgecrest Alumni & Friends (Board Member)
Harry Phillips American Inn of Court, Nashville Chapter
Historic Edgefield, Inc. (President, 2009–2011)
Nashville Bar Association
Tennessee Bar Association
Tennessee Trial Lawyers Board of Directors
Tennessee Trial Lawyers Association (Board of Governors)
Best Lawyers in America (Consumer Protection, Personal Injury Litigation–Plaintiffs, Product Liability Litigation–Plaintiffs), 2018–2024
Lawyer of the Year, Product Liability Litigation (Nashville), 2023
Lawdragon 500 Leading Plaintiff Consumer Lawyers in America, 2021–2023
Outstanding Private Practice Antitrust Achievement, American Antitrust Institute, 2020
Media interview, “Full Measure Talks to Kenny Byrd About the ‘Forgotten’ Tobacco War,” 2019
Adjunct Faculty, Vanderbilt Law School, “The Practice of Aggregate Litigation,” 2018–present
Media coverage in Nashville Scene (2015, 2017)
Paladin Award, Tennessee Association for Justice, 2015
Super Lawyers Rising Star for Mid-South, 2014
Rodolfo “Rudy” Armando Ruiz II has served as a District Judge of the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida since 2019. Judge Ruiz is a member of the Judicial Conference of the United States Committee on Court Administration and Case Management, where he chairs the Subcommittee on Legislation. He also serves on the Local Rules Committee of the Judicial Council of the United States Eleventh Judicial Circuit. Judge Ruiz is Chair of the Probation Committee for the Southern District of Florida and former Chair of the Court’s Budget Committee. He currently presides over MDL-3090, In Re: Fortra File Transfer Software Data Security Breach Litigation, his second transferee assignment from the Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation, having previously presided over MDL-2994, In Re: Mednax Services, Inc., Customer Data Security Breach Litigation.
Before his appointment to the federal bench, Judge Ruiz served as a Circuit Court Judge for the Eleventh Judicial Circuit of Florida from 2014 to 2019, and as a Miami-Dade County Court Judge from 2012 to 2014. During his service as a state court judge, he was Chair of the Florida Bar’s Civil Procedure Rules Committee and was appointed to the Florida Supreme Court Committee on Standard Jury Instructions in Criminal Cases. Judge Ruiz was also an active member of the Florida judicial faculty and served as the Eleventh Judicial Circuit Court Liaison to Dade Legal Aid.
Prior to becoming a judge, Judge Ruiz worked as an Assistant County Attorney with the Miami-Dade County Attorney’s Office from 2009 to 2012. In that role, he represented Miami-Dade County and its employees in federal and state courts at both the trial and appellate levels, serving in the Federal Litigation, Tax & Finance, and Torts Sections. Earlier, from 2006 to 2008, he was an associate with White & Case L.L.P., specializing in mergers and acquisitions, asset-backed financings, and general corporate matters as part of the firm’s Corporate Latin America practice group.
Judge Ruiz served as a law clerk to the Honorable Federico A. Moreno of the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida from 2005 to 2006. He earned a Bachelor of Science in Economics from Duke University and a Juris Doctor from Georgetown University, where he was Articles Editor for the American Criminal Law Review.
Judge Ruiz currently serves as Board Vice Chair of the Kenan Institute for Ethics at Duke University. He is also a member of the Georgetown Law Alumni Board and the Judicial Group of Directors of the South Florida Chapter of the Federal Bar Association. In addition, he has served as an adjunct professor at St. Thomas University School of Law, teaching Complex Litigation.
The chair of Lieff Cabraser’s Economic Injury Product Defect Practice Group, partner Jason L. Lichtman has extensive experience leading multidistrict and large class action litigation on behalf of consumer plaintiffs. With a practice focused on consumer protection, data privacy, and damages, Jason recently recovered more than $122 million in economic value for coffee farmers in the Kona region who sued nearly two dozen companies for selling “Kona coffee” that was not coffee from Kona. The Court described Jason as conducting one “of the most impressive class action cases I have dealt with in my time on the federal bench,” adding that his results in the litigation were “great for justice” because this was a case with “a real result that makes people whole again.”
Numerous other courts have also appointed Jason to leadership positions in large consumer protection cases, in which he has recovered more than $500 million for his clients, including the exploding Samsung Top-Loading Washing Machines case (Co-Lead Counsel); the Whirlpool Corp. Front-Loading Washer products liability litigation (Co-Lead Counsel); and the Dover v. British Airways airline overcharging case (Class Counsel). In the Whirlpool Defective Washers Products Liability litigation, Jason served as Co-Chair of the Law and Motion Committee, one of the trial counsel, and Lead Settlement Counsel, achieving a nationwide settlement strongly favorable to plaintiffs following a bellwether trial, multiple appeals to the Sixth and Seventh Circuits (all won by plaintiffs), and multiple petitions for certiorari (all defeated by plaintiffs). Jason has also secured major victories as counsel of record before numerous federal appellate courts.
Jason’s practice also includes a focus on complex damages issues, including in the Anthem Data Breach Litigation and Marriott Data Breach litigation, leading plaintiffs’ work with damages experts, including the development of highly technical, comprehensive experts reports, defending depositions of plaintiffs’ experts, and taking defendants’ experts’ depositions. The Marriott case remains pending, but Jason’s work contributed heavily to the groundbreaking settlement for plaintiffs of $115 million in Anthem, as well as significant injunctive relief targeting deficient Anthem’s cybersecurity practices. Jason also serves on the board of directors for Public Justice Foundation and is past Chair of the Public Justice Class Action Committee. Public Justice is devoted to standing up for consumers against unscrupulous payday lenders, reckless polluters, dangerous food producers, and other bad corporate actors. A multiple-year “Super Lawyer” for the New York area, he also served on the Law360 Privacy and Consumer Protection Editorial Advisory Board, providing feedback on Law360’s news coverage, including case updates, policy developments, and trends in various industries.
Judge Salas earned her B.A. from Rutgers University and her J.D. from Rutgers School of Law–Newark. After graduating from law school, Judge Salas clerked for the Honorable Eugene J. Codey, Judge of the Superior Court, Essex County Vicinage. In October 1995, Judge Salas entered private practice with the law firm of Garces and Grabler, P.C., where she focused on criminal defense and appellate litigation. In September 1997, Judge Salas joined the Office of the Federal Public Defender for the District of New Jersey. As an Assistant Federal Public Defender, she represented indigent criminal clients before both the New Jersey District Court and the Third Circuit.
On November 3, 2006, Judge Salas was sworn in as a Magistrate Judge for the District of New Jersey—the first attorney of Hispanic descent to hold that position. On June 14, 2011, the Senate unanimously confirmed President Obama’s nomination of Judge Salas as a United States District Judge. She was sworn in by the Honorable Jose L. Linares, becoming the first Latina District Judge in the District of New Jersey.
As a District Judge, Judge Salas has presided over complex civil and criminal matters, including numerous issues of first impression for the District of New Jersey. Along with Senior District Judge Katharine S. Hayden, she co-founded the District of New Jersey Pretrial Opportunity Program, which provides pre-trial judicial intervention for criminal defendants struggling with drug and alcohol addiction.
Judge Salas has received significant recognition for her work on and off the bench. Her honors include the Whipple Memorial Award from the Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers of New Jersey (2008), the Women’s Initiative and Leaders in Law Platinum Award from the New Jersey Women Lawyers Association (2015), the Woman of Substance Award from Seton Hall University’s Women’s Law Forum (2015), the Public Interest Law Foundation Award from Rutgers University (2021), the President’s Award from the Hispanic National Bar Association (2022), the Justice Thurgood Marshall Award from the New Jersey State Bar Association (2022), the Jurist Award for Making the World a More Just Place from the National Judicial College (2023), the William J. Brennan, Jr. Award from the Association of the Federal Bar of New Jersey (2023), the Excellence in Civic Engagement Award from the William J. Hughes Center for Public Policy at Stockton University (2023), the Raphael Lemkin Rule of Law Guardian Award from the Bloch Judicial Institute of Duke Law School (2024), and the Morton A. Brody Distinguished Judicial Service Award from Colby College (2024).
Judge Salas is a loving wife to her husband of 26 years, Mark Anderl, and the proud mother of her late son, Daniel Mark Anderl, who gave his life protecting his family when a disgruntled lawyer targeted Judge Salas because of her role as a federal judge. Following Daniel’s tragic murder, Judge Salas has made it her mission to secure greater protections for members of the judiciary. Her advocacy led to the passage of “Daniel’s Law” in New Jersey, and she worked tirelessly for similar federal protections. As a result, President Biden signed the Daniel Anderl Judicial Security and Privacy Act into law on December 23, 2022.
Wesley L. Hsu is a judge on the United States District Court for the Central District of California. He was nominated to the court by President Joe Biden (D) on January 23, 2023, and confirmed by the United States Senate on May 3, 2023, by a vote of 53 – 43.
The United States District Court for the Central District of California is one of 94 U.S. District Courts. They are the general trial courts of the United States federal courts.
Prior to joining the court, Hsu was a judge on the Superior Court of Los Angeles County, California.
United States United States District Court for the Central District of California (2023-present)
On January 23, 2023, President Joe Biden (D) nominated Hsu to the United States District Court for the Central District of California. He was confirmed by a 53 - 43 vote of the U.S. Senate on May 3, 2023. Hsu received commission on May 12, 2023.
Jayne Conroy is a named partner at Simmons Hanly Conroy and oversees practice areas in the Complex Litigation Department. Under her leadership, the firm has become one of the country’s largest plaintiff law firms dedicated to helping those injured by corporate wrongdoing.
With a legal career spanning more than three decades, Jayne has earned a superb national reputation as an elite trial lawyer, skilled strategist and decisive negotiator. She has consistently helped secure billions of dollars in verdicts and settlements for thousands of individuals, families and communities in numerous courtrooms nationwide.
“We are a threat to defendants because we are everywhere,” Jayne said while talking about the depth of experience in her department. “They know they have to deal with us, and we are prepared to try cases.”
Jayne focuses her practice on helping plaintiffs exclusively in mass torts, class actions, product liability, pharmaceutical and sexual abuse litigation. She serves or has served on dozens of court-appointed leadership committees in complex legal actions of national scope. These complex mass tort cases, called multidistrict litigations or MDLs, involve thousands of cases originating from state courts around the country and consolidated before a single federal judge.
Jayne is a co-lead in the National Prescription Opiate MDL and the East Palestine train derailment matter against Norfolk Southern. Jayne's most recent MDL appointment includes the Plaintiff’s Executive Committee in the In re: Camp Lejeune Water Litigation in the North Carolina Southern Division which alleges drinking may have been contaminated with toxic chemicals that can cause multiple types of cancer, birth defects, Parkinson’s disease and more. She is also on the Plaintiff’s Executive Committee in the MDL In re Hair Relaxer Marketing, Sales Practices, and Products Liability Litigation and the Plaintiff’s Steering Committee for the MDL In re McKinsey & Company Inc National Prescription Opiate Consultant Litigation, Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation, which alleges McKinsey knowingly engineered marketing tactics that caused an avalanche of opioid addiction.
The Honorable Kelley Brisbon Hodge is a United States District Court Judge for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. Judge Hodge was nominated by President Joseph R. Biden on July 12, 2022, and received her commission from the President on December 23, 2022. She was sworn in as District Judge by Chief Judge Juan R. Sánchez on December 28, 2022.
Prior to joining the federal bench, Judge Hodge was a partner in private practice in the Labor and Employment section of Fox Rothschild LLP in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Before joining Fox Rothschild LLP, Judge Hodge served as the 25th District Attorney of Philadelphia after being elected in 2017 by the Board of Judges for the Court of Common Pleas for the First Judicial District. Upon her election, Judge Hodge became the first African American woman to lead the District Attorney's Office in its 167-year history and the first African American woman to lead a District Attorney's Office in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.
As an attorney, Judge Hodge practiced law in Pennsylvania and Virginia, beginning her legal career as a public defender in Richmond, Virginia, in 1997. She later relocated to Philadelphia, where she joined the Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office in 2004. Before becoming District Attorney, Judge Hodge served as the first independent Title IX coordinator at the University of Virginia. Over her career, she was also appointed by two Pennsylvania Governors to statewide commissions focused on school safety, juvenile justice, and citizen review of law enforcement.
Across more than twenty-five years as an attorney, Judge Hodge developed extensive experience in trial practice, litigation, and compliance, focusing on education law, criminal law, government policy advising, discrimination, and civil rights.
Judge Hodge earned her Bachelor of Arts from the University of Virginia in 1993 and her Juris Doctor from the University of Richmond School of Law in 1996. She has served as a lecturer in law at the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School and the University of Virginia School of Law. She has served on numerous boards, has been recognized by various legal and professional organizations, and is active in several community-centered organizations.
Federal Judicial Service:
Judge, U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Florida
Nominated by George W. Bush on July 14, 2003, to a seat vacated by Lacey A. Collier. Confirmed by the Senate on October 20, 2003, and received commission on November 21, 2003. Served as chief judge, 2011-2018.
Other Federal Judicial Service:
U.S. Magistrate Judge, U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Florida, 2002-2003
Education:
University of West Florida, B.A., 1989
California Western School of Law, J.D., 1992
Professional Career:
U.S. Army, 1985-1987
Law clerk, Hon. Lacey A. Collier, U.S. District Court, Northern District of Florida, 1992-1994
Private practice, Pensacola, Florida, 1994-1998, 1999-2002
General counsel, West Florida Medical Center, Pensacola, Florida, 1998-1999
District Judge Linda Lopez was nominated in September 2021 to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California and confirmed by the U.S. Senate in December 2021. Prior to her confirmation, she served in the same district as a magistrate judge since her appointment in 2018. Previously, she was a senior trial attorney for the Federal Defenders of San Diego, Inc., from 2007 until her appointment to the bench. From 2003 to 2007, she was a sole practitioner, running a criminal defense firm and practicing in both state and federal court in Miami, where she defended both retained defendants and financially eligible defendants appointed to her as part of the Criminal Justice Act Panel. From 1999 to 2003, she was an attorney with a small firm in Miami where she had worked for nine years in various legal assistant positions while going to college and law school.
Judge Lopez received her Bachelor of Arts, magna cum laude, from Florida International University in 1996 and her Juris Doctor, magna cum laude and Order of the Coif, in 1999 from the University of Miami School of Law, where she served as an editor for the University of Miami Law Review.
In 2018, Judge Lopez was recognized with a Service Award for her dedicated leadership as head of the San Diego Chapter of the Federal Bar Association’s Community Outreach Committee from 2018 to 2019. In addition to her work with the Community Outreach Committee, Judge Lopez has volunteered extensively with the San Diego Chapter of the FBA throughout her career, including as a board member, and as a liaison for the Federal Defenders of San Diego, Inc. Judge Lopez is currently a Master of the Welsh Inn of Court, and was previously a Master of the Enright Inn of Court. She has served on the Board of Governors of the San Diego Chapter of the Association of Business Trial Lawyers since 2018, a Ninth Circuit Director at Large to the Federal Judicial Association since 2024, and a member of the Judging Committee for the Ninth Circuit Civics Essay Contest. Finally, Judge Lopez is on the FBA’s Judicial Advisory Board.
Sean P. Fahey is a partner and chair of Troutman Pepper’s Health Sciences Department where he leads the group’s litigation, white collar, regulatory, intellectual property, and transactional practices. He has extensive experience serving as national coordinating and trial counsel in complex, multidistrict products liability and health care litigation. He represents several of the largest pharmaceutical, medical device, and life science companies in their high-stakes cases, and also serves as strategic settlement counsel and coordinating counsel in parallel litigation, including DOJ and regulatory investigations, and congressional hearings. He is nationally recognized by clients and peers in Chambers USA, Benchmark Litigation, The Legal 500, LMG Life Sciences, and The Best Lawyers in America.
Stuart Davidson is a partner in Robbins Geller Rudman & Dowd LLP’s Boca Raton office. His practice focuses on complex consumer class actions, including cases involving deceptive and unfair trade practices, privacy and data breach issues, and antitrust violations.
He has served as class counsel in some of the nation’s most significant privacy and consumer cases, including: In re Facebook Biometric Information Privacy Litigation, No. 3:15-cv-03747-JD (N.D. Cal.) ($650 million recovery in a cutting-edge class action concerning Facebook’s alleged privacy violations through its collection of user’s biometric identifiers without informed consent); In re Yahoo! Inc. Customer Data Security Breach Litigation, No. 5:16-md-02752-LHK (N.D. Cal.) ($117.5 million recovery in the largest data breach in history); Kehoe v. Fidelity Federal Bank & Trust, No. 9:03-cv-80593-DTKH (S.D. Fla.) ($50 million recovery in Driver’s Privacy Protection Act case on behalf of half-a-million Florida drivers against a national bank); In re Sony Gaming Networks & Customer Data Security Breach Litigation, No. 3:11-md-02258-AJB-MDD (S.D. Cal.) (settlement valued at $15 million concerning the massive data breach of Sony’s PlayStation Network); and In re Solara Medical Supplies Data Breach Litigation, No. 3:19-cv-02284-H-KSC (S.D. Cal.) ($5 million all-cash settlement for victims of healthcare data breach).
Stuart currently serves as Plaintiffs’ Co-Lead Counsel in In re American Medical Collection Agency, Inc. Customer Data Security Breach Litigation, No. 2:19-md-02904-MCA-MAH (D.N.J.) (representing class of LabCorp customers), In re Independent Living Systems Data Breach Litigation, No. 1:23-cv-21060-KMW (S.D. Fla.), Garner v. Amazon.com, Inc., No. 2:21-cv-00750-RSL (W.D. Wash.) (alleging Amazon’s illegal wiretapping through Alexa-enabled devices), In re American Financial Resources, Inc. Data Breach Litigation, No. 2:22-cv-01757-MCA-JSA (D.N.J.), In re Fortra Tile Transfer Software Data Security Breach Litigation, No. 1:24-md-03090-RAR (S.D. Fla.) (representing Aetna patients), on Plaintiffs’ Executive Committee in In re Lakeview Loan Servicing Data Breach Litigation, No. 1:22-cv-20955-DPG (S.D. Fla.), and on Plaintiffs’ Steering Committee in In re FTX Cryptocurrency Exchange Collapse Litigation, No. 1:23-md-03076-KMM (S.D. Fla.). Stuart also currently represents the State of Arkansas in a major antitrust enforcement action, State of Arkansas ex rel. Griffin v. Syngenta Crop Protection AG, No. 4:22-cv-01287-BSM (E.D. Ark.).
Stuart also spearheaded several aspects of In re EpiPen (Epinephrine Injection, USP) Marketing, Sales Practices & Antitrust Litigation, No. 2:17-md-02785-DDC-TJJ (D. Kan.) ($609 million total recovery achieved weeks prior to trial in certified class action alleging antitrust claims involving the illegal reverse payment settlement to delay the generic EpiPen, which allowed the prices of the life-saving EpiPen to rise over 600% in 9 years), served as Co-Lead Class Counsel in three cases brought against Genworth Life Insurance Company on behalf of long-term care insureds, Skochin v. Genworth Life. Ins. Co., No. 3:19-cv-00049-REP (E.D. Va.); Halcom v. Genworth Life Ins. Co., No. 3:21-cv-00019-REP (E.D. Va.); and Haney v. Genworth Life Ins. Co., No. 3:22-cv-00055-REP (E.D. Va.), recovering hundreds of millions of dollars in cash damages for policyholders, and served as Plaintiffs’ Co-Lead Counsel in In re NHL Players’ Concussion Injury Litigation, No. 0:14-md-02551-SRN-BRT (D. Minn.) (representing retired National Hockey League players in multidistrict litigation suit against the NHL regarding injuries suffered due to repetitive head trauma and concussions), and in In re Pet Food Products Liability Litigation, No. 1:07-cv-02867-NLH-AMD (D.N.J.) ($24 million recovery in multidistrict consumer class action on behalf of thousands of aggrieved pet owners nationwide against some of the nation’s largest pet food manufacturers, distributors, and retailers). He also served as Plaintiffs’ Co-Lead Counsel in In re UnitedGlobalCom, Inc. Shareholder Litigation, C.A. No. 1012-VCS (Del. Ch.) ($25 million recovery weeks before trial); In re Winn-Dixie Stores, Inc. Shareholder Litigation, No. 16-2011-CA-010616 (Fla. Cir. Ct.) ($11.5 million recovery for former Winn-Dixie shareholders following the corporate buyout by BI-LO); and In re AuthenTec, Inc. Shareholder Litigation, No. 5-2012-CA-57589 (Fla. Cir. Ct.) ($10 million recovery for former AuthenTec shareholders following a merger with Apple). The latter two cases are the two largest merger and acquisition recoveries in Florida history.
Stuart is a former lead assistant public defender in the Felony Division of the Broward County, Florida Public Defender’s Office. During his tenure at the Public Defender’s Office, he tried over 30 jury trials and defended individuals charged with major crimes ranging from third-degree felonies to life and capital felonies. He has been quoted in numerous major media outlets regarding his cases, including The New York Times, The Washington Post, USA Today, U.S. News & World Report, New York Daily News, the South Florida Sun-Sentinel, the Boston Globe, the Miami Herald, The Globe & Mail, and Law360, and is a frequent speaker at conferences involving class action practice and procedure.
Stuart has been honored in the category of Outstanding Antitrust Litigation Achievement in Private Practice at the American Antitrust Institute’s Antitrust Enforcement Awards. He has also been named a Litigation Star by Benchmark Litigation, a Recommended Lawyer by The Legal 500, a Leading Lawyer in America, a Leading Litigator in America, a Leading Plaintiff Financial Lawyer, and a Leading Plaintiff Consumer Lawyer by Lawdragon, one of “Florida’s Most Effective Lawyers” by American Law Media’s Daily Business Review, and a member of The National Trial Lawyers: Top 100-Civil Plaintiffs. He has also been named a Super Lawyer by Super Lawyers Magazine. He is a member of the Sedona Conference Working Group 11 Brainstorming Group, focusing on the California Consumer Protection Act. Stuart currently serves on the 2024 Consumer Protection Editorial Advisory Board for Law360.
Stuart earned his Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science from the State University of New York at Geneseo. Stuart earned a Juris Doctor degree from the Nova Southeastern University Shepard Broad College of Law, where he graduated summa cum laude in the top 3% of his class. While in law school he was the Associate Editor for the Nova Law Review and was the recipient of Book Awards (highest grade) in Trial Advocacy, International Law, and Criminal Pretrial Practice.
Robert Shelby has been a District Judge in the District of Utah since 2012, and Chief Judge since 2018. He serves by appointment on the Committee on Defender Services for the Judicial Conference of the United States. He served on the Tenth Circuit Judicial Council from 2021-2023.
Judge Shelby obtained degrees from Utah State University and the University of Virginia School of Law. He clerked for United States District Judge J. Thomas Greene in the District of Utah, and later enjoyed a diverse private practice with an emphasis in complex commercial litigation.
He is a former President of the Salt Lake County Bar Association and the David K. Watkiss – Sutherland Inn of Court and is a Fellow of the American Bar Foundation. Judge Shelby served on active duty with the Utah Army National Guard during Operation Desert Storm before receiving an Honorable Discharge in 1994.
Judge Rita F. Lin is a U.S. District Judge in the Northern District of California. Prior to her appointment to the federal bench, she served as a Superior Court Judge in San Francisco for five years. She presided over felony trials involving crimes ranging from murder to rape to child sexual abuse, as well as a variety of criminal calendars, including mental health court and preliminary hearings. Before becoming a judge, Judge Lin was an Assistant United States Attorney in the Northern District of California in the Criminal Division. She investigated and prosecuted public corruption, illegal opioid prescriptions, organized crime, money laundering, and narcotics trafficking, among other crimes. Before that, she was a litigation partner at Morrison and Foerster, where she practiced complex commercial litigation principally involving class actions and intellectual property, and maintained an active pro bono caseload. In 2012, the Daily Journal named her one of the Top 100 Women Lawyers in California, and in 2017, the National Asian Pacific American Bar Association named her one of the Best Lawyers Under 40. Judge Lin is the first Chinese American woman to become a District Judge in the Northern District. She began her career as a law clerk for Judge Sandra Lynch on the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit. Judge Lin is a graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School
Larry Taylor is an attorney with The Cochran Firm – Dallas. His practice focuses on serious personal injury litigation concentrating in the areas of wrongful death, automobile accidents, truck accidents, as well as criminal defense cases. Larry earned his Bachelor’s Degree from Texas A&M University. He obtained his Juris Doctor from Thurgood Marshall School of Law at Texas Southern University where he served as a member of the Board of Regents. Prior to attending law school, Larry worked as an investment banker and financial strategist for small business owners.