Juan Arteaga and Lisa Linsky.

Juan Arteaga, a partner at Crowell & Moring, and Lisa Linsky, a partner at McDermott Will & Emery, will receive the 2019 “Diversity & Inclusion Champion Awards” from the New York City Bar Association, the organization has announced. 

Arteaga, whose practice in part focuses on antitrust litigation, is also the hiring partner at Crowell & Moring's New York City office and, according to a bar association news release, he has helped recruit a number of lateral female and diverse associates and counsel to the firm.

He has also created what the bar association said is a successful speaker series. The series enables New York office employees at Crowell to discuss workplace topics such as unconscious bias and strategies for ensuring that men in senior firm positions serve as effective mentors and sponsors for women in the #MeToo era, the bar association said.

In addition, Arteaga has built a strong partnership between Crowell and Legal Outreach, the bar association noted. According to Legal Outreach's website, that organization prepares urban youth from underserved New York City communities “to compete at high academic levels by using intensive legal and educational programs as tools for fostering vision, developing skills, enhancing confidence, and facilitating the pursuit of higher education.“

Arteaga, who is also a former deputy assistant attorney general for the U.S. Department of Justice's Antitrust Division, also has received numerous awards for his pro bono work and civic involvement from organizations including the New York Legal Aid Society, Legal Outreach, Her Justice, Puerto Rican Bar Association and LatinoJustice, the bar association said. 

Linsky, whose practice focuses on complex litigation including commercial, products liability, trusts and estates and LGBTQ civil rights litigation, co-led a team of McDermott lawyers who wrote and submitted an amicus brief to the U.S. Supreme Court in the Obergefell v. Hodges consolidated marriage cases, the bar association said in its statement on the awards.

Based in the New York City office, Linksy also was McDermott's first partner-in-charge of firmwide diversity and partner-in-charge of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) Diversity and Inclusion, the bar association said. 

Moreover, she formed and chaired the firm's LGBT diversity and inclusion committee, and currently she serves on the firm's pro bono and community service committee, She also serves on the board of directors for New York City's Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Community Center and is currently on the executive committee, the bar association noted.

The city bar association also said that Linsky has received several awards for work promoting diversity, inclusion and equality. Those awards have come from the New York City's Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Community Center, Minority Corporate Counsel Association and the New York Law Journal, the bar association said. She also received the City Bar's 2013 Arthur S. Leonard Award, the association noted.

“This year's Champion Award recipients are true leaders in diversity and inclusion,” said Roger Juan Maldonado, the bar association's president. 

Deborah Martin Owens, executive director of the City Bar's Office for Diversity & Inclusion, said, “This feels like a particularly important year for celebrating champions of diversity and inclusion.” She added that the bar association is “proud to continue our efforts at enhancing the diversity of the legal profession at all levels of the pipeline.”

Linsky and Arteaga will be presented with the awards and honored at a June 26 celebration dinner to be held at the bar association's West 44th Street building, the bar association also said.