Sills Cummis Litigation Department Expands

On Feb 22, 2018

Sills Cummis & Gross adds litigators James E. Tyrrell, Jr., George R. Talarico, Elissa J. Glasband, Eric S. Westenberger and Patrick C. Gilmartin, all of whom join the law firm from Locke Lord.

Jim Tyrrell stated, “While the team’s litigation is national in scope, we chose Sills Cummis & Gross because of the Firm’s roots in New Jersey and New York.  A regionally headquartered law firm like Sills Cummis & Gross allows us to provide clients with the best service at the best price.  While results always count, service and price continue to be major drivers for corporate clients in their choice of outside counsel.”

Tyrrell and his team focus on mass tort, product liability and commercial litigation.  Tyrrell, who has been dubbed the “Master of Disaster,” is a go-to lawyer for major companies involved in toxic tort, product liability and environmental litigation.  Tyrrell and others on the team have successfully resolved numerous high-stakes matters.  Tyrrell’s toxic tort work started in the 1980s as lead counsel for Monsanto in the Agent Orange litigation.  He has consistently handled high-profile cases, including: the Y2K litigation for Lucent and Avaya, Deepwater Horizon for SEACOR, the DES litigation for Glaxo, the Alcohol Litigation for Brown Forman, Breast Implants for General Electric and Environmental Litigation for Exxon.  Tyrrell was selected over 30 competing firms to represent the City of New York and 150 of its contractors in the landmark World Trade Center Litigation involving over 10,000 cases of toxic exposure following the 9/11 attacks.

Prior to joining Sills Cummis & Gross, Tyrrell was co-chair of the Product Liability and Toxic Tort Practice Group at Latham & Watkins, where he also served as managing partner of the firm’s New Jersey office.  Tyrrell was global chair for Product Liability and Toxic Torts, and New Jersey/New York regional managing partner at Patton Boggs.  Most recently, Tyrrell served as the co-chair of the Product Liability Group at Locke Lord.

Tyrrell has been widely recognized as one of the leading product liability/toxic tort lawyers in the country by numerous rating organizations including: Chambers USA, The Best Lawyers in America, Lawdragon 500 and Super Lawyers.  Named as “Lawyer of the Week” by The American Lawyer, Tyrrell’s practice group was chosen by the New Jersey Law Journal as Product Liability and Mass Tort Practice Group of the Year in both 2013 and 2015.

Tyrrell will join as a member of the firm and co-chair of the firm’s Mass Tort Practice Group.  Talarico, Glasband, Westenberger and Gilmartin all join as members of the firm.

Prior to joining Sills Cummis & Gross, George Talarico was office managing partner of Locke Lord’s New Jersey office.  Prior to Locke Lord, he was a partner at Thacher Proffitt & Wood.  Elissa Glasband, Eric Westenberger and Patrick Gilmartin are all part of the team that that left Patton Boggs with Tyrrell in 2014.

“It is an exciting time at Sills Cummis & Gross.  Having such a renowned litigation team join Sills Cummis & Gross expands upon our already strong litigation capabilities for our clients.  I think the team has found a perfect home,” said Sills Cummis & Gross Managing Partner Max Crane.

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