Original article by Jake Maher featured in Law360.com on November 8, 2024.
A longtime Fox Rothschild LLP litigator and former chair of the firm's alternative dispute resolution practice is launching his own complex litigation boutique in Trenton, New Jersey, focusing on both trials and appeals.
Jeffrey M. Pollock recently unveiled Pollock Law LLC, saying on social media that the new firm is a chance to pursue a dream of his after a 37-year run in BigLaw.
"I offer my most sincere thanks to all of those who have helped me make this transition — and I'm looking forward to the next chapter of my career!" Pollock wrote on LinkedIn.
Pollock added in an email to Law360 Pulse on Friday that his goal for the new firm is "killing the billable hour."
"BigLaw is wedded to the billable hour, which guarantees payment to the law firm but gives no predictability to the client. I am changing that dynamic by partnering with my clients — Pollock Law is focussed on mixed contingencies, so that the client has a predictable monthly or yearly spend," Pollock wrote. "In exchange for a lower payment I am taking the risk with the client, I receive a contingent interest in the outcome."
Pollock noted that he is a New Jersey Supreme Court-certified civil trial attorney and has been lead trial counsel on cases from New York and New Jersey to Ohio, Idaho and Nevada.
"I will continue trying cases and arguing appeals for the next 10 years," Pollock said. "Providing the highest quality work is critical to me — when I cannot do that, I will hang up my spurs."
Pollock has litigated numerous high-profile cases in the Garden State, including several ongoing matters.
He currently represents Nicole Alexander, a former business development director for McElroy Deutsch Mulvaney & Carpenter LLP who is accused of stealing millions from the firm, along with her husband, the firm's former chief financial officer. That blockbuster litigation has gone on for about a year and a half. Most recently, Alexander won a bid to add a malicious prosecution claim to her countersuit against the firm alleging that she was fired discriminatorily.
Pollock is also representing Beasley Allen Law Firm in talc litigation against Johnson & Johnson. The firm, which sits on the plaintiffs' steering committee in the multidistrict litigation, has faced multiple disqualification bids from J&J.
Stretching further back, Pollock has had a hand in various other major New Jersey lawsuits.
Pollock represented Princeton University in suing several parties in 2019 that it alleged were responsible for delays in constructing an environmental research center that cost the university millions of dollars.
He was also appointed to represent inmates at the Cumberland County Jail who sued the jail's warden for allegedly inadequate COVID-19 prevention measures.
And Pollock has handled cases involving different kinds of contamination, including representing the New York Housing Authority in a suit against a construction supplier regarding asbestos, and the company Compaction Systems in litigation around the environmental cleanup of the Combe Fill South Landfill Superfund site in Morris County.
Pollock was a partner at Sills Cummis & Gross PC for nine years before moving to Fox Rothschild, and worked as an associate at Day Pitney LLP earlier in his career. He holds an undergraduate degree from Hamilton College and a law degree from New York University School of Law.
Pollock said on LinkedIn that paralegal Derek Chapman and administrative assistant Andrea Wiener are joining him at his new firm. The firm's office is at 400 Riverfront Plaza in Trenton — directly next to the Trenton Thunder minor league baseball stadium, Pollock noted.
--Editing by Amy French.
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