CALIFORNIA’S TOP 30 SECURITIES LITIGATORSCALIFORNIA’S TOP 30 SECURITIES LITIGATORS

CheckpointWhen it comes to corporate scandal, the attorneys on our list of thestate’s Top 30 Securities Litigators have seen it all. Whether they’re

defending major corporations or filing class actions against them, theselawyers have a knack for getting what they want.

Security

May 31, 2005

Supplement to the Los Angeles Daily Journaland San Francisco Daily Journal

Trials, transactionsand the insider’s guideto the practice of law.

Enron. Krispy Kreme. Time Warner.Homestore. WorldCom.

Corporate America has keptCalifornia’s top securities litigatorsfrazzled defending their statements andmisstatements hoping to protectthemselves from shelling out millions, oreven billons, to shareholders.

And those shareholders know justwhom to call when they’ve been donewrong.

Selecting the top 30 securities litigatorsin California was something akin tounderstanding Sarbanes-Oxley’s pro-visions.

Daily Journal EXTRA editors called onexperts in the field and asked them toevaluate their peers. We got more than100 nominations for the amazing groupprofiled on the following pages. Weexcluded many of the state’s leading

commercial lawyers who don’t principallyhandle securities litigation.

And, while it’s normally our policy tolimit our selections to one attorney perfirm or, in rare instances, two, we wereforced to change that policy this time.

We found that much of the state’ssecurities work is centered in a handfulof firms: on the plaintiffs’ side, LerachCoughlin Stoia Geller Rudman &Robbins and Cotchett, Pitre, Simon &McCarthy; on the defense side, WilsonSonsini Goodrich & Rosati, HellerEhrman, and Orrick, Herrington &Sutcliffe.

It’s also clear that Brobeck, Phleger &Harrison alums reign supreme. Fourlawyers — Mike Torpey and DanielTyukody of Orrick Herrington, WilliamSullivan of Paul, Hastings, Janofsky &Walker and Sara Brody of Heller Ehrman

— worked together at the securitiespowerhouse before its demise in 2003.

Though those firms stack the house, it’salso clear that great securities work is beingdone by most of the state’s leading firms,from Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flompartner Thomas Nolan’s handling of theWorldCom settlement to Lieff, Cabraser,Heimann & Bernstein partner JamesFinberg’s recovery of 100 percent of hisclients’ losses in the California MicroDevices Securities Litigation.

Probably no group of California lawyersis in such demand these days as securitieslitigators, who toss about billion-dollarclaims like another order of fries. When ahandful of them gathered for the photoshoot atop Skadden Arps’ downtown LosAngeles headquarters, it was clear theytruly are on top of the world.

— Stefanie Knapp

When Boris Feldman joined WilsonSonsini Goodrich & Rosati 18 years ago,he left his antitrust litigation practice andthrew his hat into the securities ring.

“I got started because when I moved toCalifornia, [securities] was the type oflitigation clients had and the reality ofwhat they needed,” Feldman says. “Butnow it’s sort of like getting paid to readpulp fiction.”

Feldman says the fast-paced, high-stakes cases that securities law offers aregenerally very interesting and thepractice affords him the opportunity toget to know his Fortune 500 clients on anintimate level.

When Guidant Corp., an Indianapolis-based manufacturer of cardiovasculardevices, merged with Johnson & Johnsonin a $25 billion deal in 2004, Guidanttapped Feldman to defend it from ashareholder derivative lawsuit . InNovember, Feldman took the case to theIndiana Supreme Court. The casequestions an Indiana law on the standardby which a court should evaluate ashareholder’s decision not to make ademand to a public corporation’s boardof directors before filing a derivative suit.

Feldman is currently defending 51jobInc., the publisher of a Chineseemployment newspaper, in what he callsa classic shareholder class action filed inJanuary in federal court in the SouthernDistrict of the New York. Feldman saysthe company is being sued for securitiesfraud because soon after going public,51job fell short of its quarterly earningsprojections and had to restate them.

In 2001, when Hewlett-Packard Co.

Boris FeldmanWilson Sonsini Goodrich & RosatiPalo Alto

merged with Compaq Computer Corp. ina $25 billion deal, Walter Hewlett,Hewlett-Packard’s director and the son ofits founder, tried to block the deal.Representing Hewlett-Packard, Feldmandefeated Walter Hewlett in a trial beforethe Delaware Court of Chancery in 2002.

In the past two years, Feldman has wonshareholder lawsuits for Genetech Inc.,3Com Corp., Rambus Inc., Tularik Inc. andothers.

Over the course of his career, Feldmanhas represented companies and theirofficers in 105 shareholder class actionsand derivative lawsuits.

Vaughn Walker, Chief Judge of the U.S.District Court for the Northern District ofCalifornia, praises Feldman as one of thetop lawyers in securities law.

According to Walker, in the wake of thePrivate Securities Litigation Reform Actof 1995, Feldman advocated for the

Over the course of his career, Wilson Sonsini partner Boris Feldman hasrepresented companies and their officers in 105 shareholder class actionsand derivative lawsuits.

Photo by S. Todd Rogers

CALIFORNIA’S TOP 30 SECURITIES LITIGATORSCALIFORNIA’S TOP 30 SECURITIES LITIGATORS

creation of an online database at StanfordLaw School to track securities actions.However, the San Francisco BarAssociation opposed the idea.

“Boris and Jim Finberg had quite alobbying effort to dissuade the SanFrancisco Bar [from opposing the database]and were ultimately successful in doing so,”Walker says. “[The Securities Class ActionClearinghouse] was the precursor toelectronic court filing, which 10 years later,is not only common but required invirtually all civil and criminal cases. Boris,along with others, was very much in theforefront of that endeavor.”

The Clearinghouse is a research agentfor investors, policymakers, scholars,judges, lawyers and the media to accesscourt fi l ings and daily updates ofhundreds federal securities fraud classactions.

— Amy K. Spees

To hear his clients tell it, Steven Schatzof Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati canhandle any problem, anywhere, any time.

“I believe in my core he can handleanything,” says Stacey Giamalis, formervice president, general counsel andsecretary of QRS Corp. and CrossWorldSoftware. “He doesn’t care about winningfor winning’s sake, but he cares very muchabout helping the client prove that it’sright.”

Among the situations Schatz helpedGiamalis handle was QRS’s decision tobreak a deal to be acquired in favor of asecond, higher bid.

“It was a high-scrutiny situation, and weended up getting a better deal withoutliability, and nobody sued,” she says.

He also defended CrossWorld’s officersand directors in a shareholder suit when itwas acquired by IBM Corp.

Schatz was recruited to Wilson Sonsini’sfledgling securities litigation practice in1984 from his partnership at Arnold &Porter, which he joined after four years atthe U.S. attorney’s office in New York.

There, he convicted the Beatles formermanager of tax evasion and prosecuted theNo. 3 member of the U.S. Mission to theUnited Nations for a scandal that the NewYork Post dubbed “Dollars and Sex at theU.N.”

Schatz saw the opportunity in SiliconValley and never looked back. His largestcase was the 2002 Hewlett-Packard trial, inwhich he turned back a challenge to the$22 billion merger of Compaq ComputerCorp. and Hewlett-Packard Co. from Walter

Steven SchatzWilson Sonsini Goodrich & RosatiPalo Alto

Hewlett, the son of co-founder WilliamHewlett.

Schatz has represented Hewlett-Packardin four class actions, including a currentfraud-by-hindsight case initially filed inConnecticut and recently transferred toCalifornia.

He’s also representing Siebel Systems Inc.in the first challenge to Regulation FD,pending in U.S. District Court for theSouthern District of New York. RegulationFD was adopted by the Securities andExchange Commission in 2000 to preventselective disclosure by public companiesto market professionals and certain share-holders.

Schatz, who has been lead counsel for 80

companies in securities class actions, is partof Wilson Sonsini’s premier securitieslitigation practice, which wins 45 percentof its cases at the motion-to-dismiss stage.

“I think it’s the job of the defense bar tosensitize the courts that the plaintiffs aretrying to erode the high bar that Congressestablished when it passed the reform act,”Schatz says. “It wasn’t the reform act thatcaused some of the more noteworthy frauds.

“Those were individuals who chose toignore the law. And I’m convinced thereform act itself had nothing to do with thefrauds, and the protections it affords are stillimportant,” says Wilson Sonsini partnerSteven Schatz.

— Katrina Dewey

“I’m convinced that the reform act itself had nothing to do with the frauds,and the protection it affords are still important,” says Wilson Sonsini part-ner Steven Schatz.

Photo by Xiang Xing Zhou

CALIFORNIA’S TOP 30 SECURITIES LITIGATORSCALIFORNIA’S TOP 30 SECURITIES LITIGATORS

How do you get from doughnuts to jetairplanes in one easy step? Call BruceVanyo.

The partner with Wilson SonsiniGoodrich & Rosati in Palo Alto hasdefended companies of every size, industryand area in securities matters.

“They’re not confined to any industry,”he says. “High-tech, low-tech, no-tech,retail, consumer. I represented a gold mineonce.”

His clients include the Boeing Co.,America West Airlines, Fluor Corp., SunMicrosystems Inc. and Dell Computer Corp.

At the moment, he’s got a sweet client:Winston-Salem, N.C.-based Krispy KremeDoughnuts Inc. It’s a case Vanyo says has“got everything”: an investigation by theSecurities and Exchange Commission, acriminal investigation by the U.S. attorney’soffice for the Southern District of New York,a proposed employee class action allegingEmployee Retirement Income Security Actviolations and a shareholder class actionalleging fraud by officers. Vanyo representsthe company and some of its officers in allof these matters.

The SEC investigation is in its advancedstages, he says, with testimony currentlybeing taken; the U.S. attorney’sinvestigation is following along. The classaction, by contrast, is just getting under waywith an amended complaint expected soon.Plaintiffs haven’t specified damages, butVanyo expects them to be substantial.

He recently represented another client,America West Airlines, in what he called aclassic securities fraud class action, in which

Bruce VanyoWilson Sonsini Goodrich & RosatiPalo Alto

an employees’ union alleged that certainofficers and shareholders of the airlinecompany artificially inflated the stock priceand engaged in insider trading, causing theunion’s pension fund and other shareholdersto lose tens of millions of dollars. That casewas set for trial last November, but Vanyosays it settled on the courthouse steps for$15 million.

“We are very pleased with the outcomealthough we, as lawyers, wanted to try thecase,” Vanyo says.

Plaintiffs’ counsel Patrick Coughlin, aname partner at San Diego-based LerachCoughlin Stoia Geller Rudman & Robbins,often finds himself across the table fromVanyo. He cites Vanyo’s Fortune 500

clients and involvement with a crucialappellate ruling on the Private SecuritiesLitigation Reform Act of 1995, whichestablished that plaintiffs bringing casesunder the act must show deliberaterecklessness, as reasons for the defensecounsel’s prominence.

“I’ve always found him to bestraightforward and honest and candid whendealing with these [securities] issues,”Coughlin says. “I’ve always seen that hehad compassion not only for the CEO orCFO that he represents along with thecompany but also the employees of thecompany in general and concern about whatthe future of the company’s going to be.”

— Lorelei Laird

Bruce Vanyo of Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati currently represents doughnut-maker Krispy Kreme Doughnuts Inc. in a case that has “got everything,” includingan investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commision, a proposed employeeclass action and a shareholder class action alleging fraud by officers.

Photo by Xiang Xing Zhou

CALIFORNIA’S TOP 30 SECURITIES LITIGATORSCALIFORNIA’S TOP 30 SECURITIES LITIGATORS

Reprinted with permission from the Daily Journal EXTRA. ©2005 Daily Journal Corporation. All rights reserved. Reprinted by Scoop ReprintSource 1-