After two years as executive vice president and general counsel at Guardian Life Insurance Co. of America, Eric Dinallo has returned to Debevoise & Plimpton to chair the firm's insurance regulatory practice.

Dinallo will also be a partner in the firm's financial institutions and white-collar and regulatory defense groups. A former prosecutor, he spent four years as an assistant district attorney in New York County and another four years as chief of the Investor Protection Bureau at the New York State Office of the Attorney General.

This dual role—as an insurance practice leader and white-collar defense partner—was a crucial motivating factor in Dinallo's decision to return to to Debevoise, where he was a partner between 2010 and 2017.

"In a day where clients are increasingly going toward specialization I feel privileged that I get to be a part of these practices," Dinallo said.

In addition to his experience as an insurance partner at Debevoise, Dinallo was the New York State Superintendent of Insurance for two and a half years and played a crucial role in helping lead New York and the insurance industry through the financial crisis.

His latest stint at Guardian Insurance was his third in-house gig. From 2003 to 2006, Dinallo served as managing director of Morgan Stanley's regulatory affairs group. And from 2006 to 2007, he worked as GC at the insurance multinational Willis Group.

But building a diverse, fast-paced practice at a firm he refers to as "home" was too enticing for Dinallo to resist. He added that his in-house experience allows him to better serve and understand his clients in private practice.

"I began to understand better why the clients come to us. Why do they need a law firm of the excellence of Debevoise? What is it that's driving them?" he said. "Often it's complexity, often it's size of the matter, often it's novelty. A lot of change is going on in the financial services arena. And there's a constant energy and challenge in the regulatory space right now."

Dinallo pointed to differing regulations regarding the underwriting of insurance policies, which are handled state by state, as regulators come to grips with the growth of online policies, data and artificial intelligence. In Massachusetts, for example, the legislature passed a law in 2019 prohibiting companies from using gender as a factor in underwriting disability insurance.

"As the states have become more and more active [in insurance regulation], you're seeing more activity that clients need help with in all 50 states," he said.

Dinallo also gave a strong endorsement of Debevoise's lockstep compensation system. Amid constant pressure on elite law firms to offer competitive pay to high-performing lawyers, partners at the firm reviewed their lockstep rules last year and decided to stick with the same system it has had in place for decades.

"I'm a tremendous fan of the lockstep compensation system," he said. "It creates a lot of collaboration and gives clients a really special service because all attorneys are working for the same goal and aligns financial incentives."

Correction: An earlier version of this article misstated Dinallo's prior title as a prosecutor in New York. 

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