(L-R)  Mark Heise, Patricia Melville and Luiz Suarez 

Three Boies Schiller Flexner partners based out of Miami — Mark Heise, Luis Suarez, and Patricia Melville — have left the firm to create their own litigation boutique: Coral Gables-based Heise Suarez Melville.

The business model for the new minority- and woman-owned firm will notably depart from Boies Schiller's mostly hourly model and instead offer alternative fee arrangements, including fixed, contingency and success fees. This strategy has become increasingly common among successful boutique firms, such as Wilkinson Walsh + Eskovitz.

"Business people like that," Suarez said. "They want precision and certainty."

The three litigators have been working together for close to 20 years, having arrived at Boies Schiller around the same time. Heise has been trying complex litigation cases involving, among others, tobacco defense and medical malpractice for three decades. He spent 17 years at Boies Schiller, having merged his own firm in 2002 after a lunch with Boies Schiller partner Steve Zack.

His most notable recent case came when he led a Boies Schiller team in a multidistrict class action case against car parts manufacturer Takata connected to defective air bags. So far, the case has resulted in the recovery of $1.5 billion for the plaintiffs.

Suarez, who was recently elevated to equity partnership at Boies Schiller, tries high-risk, bet-the-company cases. He also works on anti-trust litigation, including a lawsuit against a cancer treatment provider for its use of noncompete clauses for its doctors. Suarez is also past chair of the Eleventh District Judicial Nominating Commission.

Melville quickly rose to the Boies Schiller partnership and handles a wide variety of litigation involving national banks and health insurance companies. She is an active member of the National Association of Women Lawyers and climbed to the top of Boies Schiller after making her way through night school while working as a receptionist and secretary.

Boies Schiller is in the midst of a leadership transition with vaunted, and recently controversial, leader David Boies ceding some responsibilities to New York-based partner Nicholas Gravante and London-based partner Natasha Harrison. The firm now operates under four managing partners: Boies, Gravante, Harrison and name partner Jonathan Schiller.

The three litigation boutique founders praised their former firm and Boies Schiller partner Steve Zack, who they see as a mentor. (Zack recently received a lifetime achievement award from The American Lawyer.) The spinoff is wholly a result of their own ambitions, they said — an opportunity to create.

"[The transition] is not even a blip on our radar," Heise said. "We have a vision for reaching for the moon and this is our opportunity to do that."

Zack, the administrative partner for Boies Schiller's Miami office and executive committee member, wished his colleagues well in a statement: "I've enjoyed working with these attorneys. At one time in my own life, I left a large practice to start my own firm so I understand the itch and wish them the very best.''

He also highlighted recent high-profile hires for the firm, including former Black, Srebnick, Kornspan & Stumpf partner Marcos Beaton and civil and criminal attorney Marshall Dore Louis.

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Boies Schiller Names 2 New Leaders Amid Transition at the Top