State Attorneys General

State Attorneys General (State AGs) will continue their increased enforcement efforts across the United States, often with enhanced collaboration with federal authorities. Companies, boards of directors, and individuals confronting enforcement actions by any of the various state agencies must also face multi-faceted business and legal issues involving potential criminal, regulatory and civil liability, and reputational issues associated with the challenges of social media and brand protection.

Our Approach:

How do state governments make their cases, and how can their targets achieve a favorable resolution? NP’s State Attorneys General practice team represents clients by using our decades of experience on the government side of various civil and criminal matters, spanning numerous industries and subject matters that are often unique to State AG matters, including:

• consumer protection
• financial and tech fraud
• real estate securities
• Martin Act, Executive Law and Donnelly Act matters in New York
• antitrust and price gouging
• False Claims Act (“FCA”)
• Civil Investigative Demands (“CID”)
• multi-state investigations

Our team includes former assistant attorneys general, chiefs and counsels from major criminal and civil enforcement divisions across the U.S., and a deep bench of experienced criminal defense lawyers. This background positions us to conduct sensitive internal investigations, interact with state government authorities, and vigorously defend clients who find themselves as subjects of, or witnesses in, these matters.

Our primary goal is to assist clients in building strategic regulatory and internal compliance measures and programs to avoid state AG exposure. But when state enforcement actions become unavoidable, our highly skilled trial lawyers across 12 U.S. offices go to work. We have achieved favorable results for individuals and companies in some of the nation’s largest and highest-profile civil and criminal proceedings initiated by State AGs.

In addition to addressing the concerns of various enforcers, including state and federal collaboration in areas such as antitrust, environmental and civil rights, our team stands out for its ability to perfect applicable insurance coverage for civil liability, prosecute cross-claims against other responsible parties, and restore trust and confidence in a brand.  These are distinct activities, but crucial to the successful representation of clients. Our aim, and our expectation, is effective resolution with minimal disruption to clients’ businesses.

Our services:

• Crisis management and immediate response associated with investigations, including those involving state and federal collaboration
• Collection, production and review of physical and electronic data
• Witness preparation
• Advocacy submissions
• Statutory and regulatory compliance on real estate securities matters in New York
• Representation on Martin Act, Executive Law and Donnelly Act investigations and litigations in New York
• Litigation against various AG offices for individuals and companies, including matters that began as, or continued through, multi-state AG investigations, and that involve parallel federal government enforcement and regulatory proceedings.

Who we work with:

• Life sciences, pharmaceutical, medical device companies
• Health care
• Financial services and securities
• Real estate developers and sponsors
• Higher education
• For-profit education
• Office product supply
• Telecommunications
• Technology
• Security and defense
• Municipal contracting
• State-wide provision of services to public agencies