Cozen O'Connor has added a trio of lawyers to its institutional response group from various backgrounds in prosecution, higher education and Big Law.

Helen Park, Peter Lim and Adam Shapiro each joined Cozen O'Connor as counsel in its Philadelphia office, the firm announced Thursday.

Park comes from the Philadelphia District Attorney's Office, where she was assistant chief of the juvenile court unit. In that role, she made investigation and charging decisions regarding juvenile offenders accused of sexual assault, managing a staff of 15 lawyers and 18 staff.

During her time at the DA's office, Park said, she noticed that Cozen O'Connor's institutional response group's chair and vice chair, former Philadelphia prosecutors Gina Maisto Smith and Leslie Gomez, had a strong reputation among her fellow prosecutors. “They were really celebrated and famous for their commitment and their work,” Park said.

She said the child-protection element of the group's work is particularly important to her. After working as a prosecutor, where she was often dealing with individual responses to misconduct, “The opportunity to work on something on a larger-scale, and really change the culture and flip the lens, that's something that excited me about coming to work here,” Park said.

Lim was most recently at the University of Pennsylvania as deputy sexual violence investigative officer. He was in that role for three years. Before that, he was a trial attorney in the homicide unit and family violence and sexual assault unit of the Philadelphia District Attorney's Office.

“The institutional response group is really the only practice of its kind in the nation,” Lim said. “It's a unique opportunity to work on issues that improve people's lives.”

Given his direct experience with higher education, he added that Cozen O'Connor's “appreciation that each campus culture is different” was appealing to him.

Shapiro was an associate at Sullivan & Cromwell in New York from 2011 to 2017, where he was part of the criminal defense and investigations group. After that, he worked as an independent contractor in Philadelphia for Kroll, the global investigations and risk management firm. There, Shapiro conducted investigations related to sexual and gender-based harassment and violence at a large public higher-education institution, though he said he could not name the entity.

He said Cozen O'Connor stood out to him as “probably the top firm that's in this space” with regard to its work for educational institutions. He said he sought out the firm after moving to Philadelphia.

“Helen, Peter, and Adam each bring substantial yet very distinct legal backgrounds that will contribute to our group's ability to work in partnership with institutions and help them develop trauma-informed, fair and impartial Title IX and child protection programs,” Gomez, vice chair of the group, said in a statement.

Cozen O'Connor launched the institutional response group in 2017, when Gomez and Smith joined the firm from Pepper Hamilton. Since then, it has continued to grow the practice, including its acquisition of a Vermont-based campus safety consultancy.

Cozen O'Connor CEO Michael Heller said in a statement that the institutional response group has become “the preeminent investigations [and] compliance practice in the country.” He said that has helped attract hires “who are looking to focus exclusively on what is for other firms a still-developing, part-time practice area.”

Spokespeople for the Philadelphia District Attorney's Office and the University of Pennsylvania did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Park's and Lim's departures.

Read More

Cozen O'Connor Acquires Campus Safety Consulting Firm