Brown Rudnick White-Collar Defense Partner Launches Boutique
Justin Weddle quietly launched his own two-person law firm in New York last month after five years at Brown Rudnick and a 15-year career at the Justice Department.
June 25, 2019 at 06:19 PM
3 minute read
Justin Weddle, who spent five years at Brown Rudnick after a 15-year career at the Justice Department, quietly launched his own New York boutique last month.
His two-lawyer firm also includes former Brown Rudnick associate Julia Catania. In an interview with ALM, Weddle said while he greatly enjoyed his time at Brown Rudnick, he simply wanted to be his own boss. Weddle said he plans to use technology and other arrangements to tackle a range of large and small cases in his white-collar defense boutique.
Among his ongoing matters, Weddle is representing Jeffrey Wada, a former staffer at the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board who awaits sentencing after being convicted of sharing regulatory secrets with auditors at KPMG. Weddle has also represented Alfredo Hawit, a Honduran football official charged in the FIFA corruption scandal.
His cases have also included defending Paul Robson, accused of participating in a Libor-rigging conspiracy, as well as handling litigation in the U.S. related to a major Brazilian corruption investigation and cases related to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's appointment of administrative law judges and its use of disgorgement.
While Weddle Law, as his new firm is called, may not be handling the Dieselgate-type defenses or investigations that require a dozen associates to jet across the country, Weddle said he is off to a busy start. Like many lawyers, he said, he has embraced the use of technology to help him keep costs low while enabling his firm to punch above its weight when cases get complex.
“I don't have a copy service. I don't have a giant file room,” he said. “I manage my documents on my iPad.”
Weddle said conflicts weren't really an issue at Brown Rudnick and not something that drove his decision to launch his own firm. That said, he noted that big law firms are sometimes wary of taking on individual clients because of the risk of a conflict. And at the prices big law firms charge, he said, going to trial can be unaffordable for some clients.
By starting one's own firm, Weddle said, “you have the freedom to continue to do the same types of white-collar work [as big law firms do] by scaling up or scaling down as appropriate.”
As a prosecutor in the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York, Weddle worked in the Computer, Hacking and Intellectual Property section, the Major Crimes Unit, the Complex Frauds Unit and the Securities and Commodities Fraud Task Force. His high-profile cases in the prosecutor's office included Rajat Gupta's appeal of his insider-trading conviction and the United States v. KPMG and United States v. Stein tax-shelter cases.
From 2008 to 2010, he was the resident legal adviser—something of a diplomatic role, he said—to an international law enforcement “fusion center” in Romania, and after returning to New York, he became a deputy chief appellate attorney in the U.S. Attorney's Office.
This content has been archived. It is available through our partners, LexisNexis® and Bloomberg Law.
To view this content, please continue to their sites.
Not a Lexis Subscriber?
Subscribe Now
Not a Bloomberg Law Subscriber?
Subscribe Now
NOT FOR REPRINT
© 2025 ALM Global, LLC, All Rights Reserved. Request academic re-use from www.copyright.com. All other uses, submit a request to [email protected]. For more information visit Asset & Logo Licensing.
You Might Like
View AllMayor's Advisory Committee To Hold Hearing on Fitness of Judicial Candidates
2 minute readMayor's Advisory Committee To Hold Hearing on Fitness of Judicial Candidates
1 minute readMayor's Advisory Committee To Hold Hearing on Fitness of Judicial Candidates
2 minute readTrending Stories
- 1Inherent Diminished Value Damages Unavailable to 3rd-Party Claimants, Court Says
- 2Pa. Defense Firm Sued by Client Over Ex-Eagles Player's $43.5M Med Mal Win
- 3Losses Mount at Morris Manning, but Departing Ex-Chair Stays Bullish About His Old Firm's Future
- 4Zoom Faces Intellectual Property Suit Over AI-Based Augmented Video Conferencing
- 5Judge Grants TRO Blocking Federal Funding Freeze
Who Got The Work
J. Brugh Lower of Gibbons has entered an appearance for industrial equipment supplier Devco Corporation in a pending trademark infringement lawsuit. The suit, accusing the defendant of selling knock-off Graco products, was filed Dec. 18 in New Jersey District Court by Rivkin Radler on behalf of Graco Inc. and Graco Minnesota. The case, assigned to U.S. District Judge Zahid N. Quraishi, is 3:24-cv-11294, Graco Inc. et al v. Devco Corporation.
Who Got The Work
Rebecca Maller-Stein and Kent A. Yalowitz of Arnold & Porter Kaye Scholer have entered their appearances for Hanaco Venture Capital and its executives, Lior Prosor and David Frankel, in a pending securities lawsuit. The action, filed on Dec. 24 in New York Southern District Court by Zell, Aron & Co. on behalf of Goldeneye Advisors, accuses the defendants of negligently and fraudulently managing the plaintiff's $1 million investment. The case, assigned to U.S. District Judge Vernon S. Broderick, is 1:24-cv-09918, Goldeneye Advisors, LLC v. Hanaco Venture Capital, Ltd. et al.
Who Got The Work
Attorneys from A&O Shearman has stepped in as defense counsel for Toronto-Dominion Bank and other defendants in a pending securities class action. The suit, filed Dec. 11 in New York Southern District Court by Bleichmar Fonti & Auld, accuses the defendants of concealing the bank's 'pervasive' deficiencies in regards to its compliance with the Bank Secrecy Act and the quality of its anti-money laundering controls. The case, assigned to U.S. District Judge Arun Subramanian, is 1:24-cv-09445, Gonzalez v. The Toronto-Dominion Bank et al.
Who Got The Work
Crown Castle International, a Pennsylvania company providing shared communications infrastructure, has turned to Luke D. Wolf of Gordon Rees Scully Mansukhani to fend off a pending breach-of-contract lawsuit. The court action, filed Nov. 25 in Michigan Eastern District Court by Hooper Hathaway PC on behalf of The Town Residences LLC, accuses Crown Castle of failing to transfer approximately $30,000 in utility payments from T-Mobile in breach of a roof-top lease and assignment agreement. The case, assigned to U.S. District Judge Susan K. Declercq, is 2:24-cv-13131, The Town Residences LLC v. T-Mobile US, Inc. et al.
Who Got The Work
Wilfred P. Coronato and Daniel M. Schwartz of McCarter & English have stepped in as defense counsel to Electrolux Home Products Inc. in a pending product liability lawsuit. The court action, filed Nov. 26 in New York Eastern District Court by Poulos Lopiccolo PC and Nagel Rice LLP on behalf of David Stern, alleges that the defendant's refrigerators’ drawers and shelving repeatedly break and fall apart within months after purchase. The case, assigned to U.S. District Judge Joan M. Azrack, is 2:24-cv-08204, Stern v. Electrolux Home Products, Inc.
Featured Firms
Law Offices of Gary Martin Hays & Associates, P.C.
(470) 294-1674
Law Offices of Mark E. Salomone
(857) 444-6468
Smith & Hassler
(713) 739-1250