Sep. 12, 2013
Thomas D. Long
See more on Thomas D. LongNossaman LLP | Los Angeles | Practice type: Litigation
Long can remember with stunning clarity the morning his verdict was read.
He can recount what the jury foreman was wearing - a black suit, "like he was going on a job interview" - when he delivered the 26-page questionnaire. And he said he won't ever forget the amount of time it took U.S. District Judge Dale S. Fischer to review the form silently before reading the verdict.
"It was the longest five minutes of my life," he said. "I probably aged five years."
Long led the team that in December 2012 secured unanimous verdict of more than $168 million on behalf of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. in FDIC v. Van Dellen, CV10-4915 (C.D. Cal., filed July 2, 2010). The FDIC had sued three executives of IndyMac Bank FSB's homebuilder division for negligence and breach of fiduciary duty involving 23 loans made leading up to the 2008 housing bubble burst.
The case, which was the first filed against bankers following the housing meltdown, garnered national attention for challenging the belief that the economic decline was impossible to have predicted.
Long had worked on the case from a few months after IndyMac bank failed in 2008 - the first of many banks to do so in what was later dubbed the Great Recession - up until the end of the trial last year, having conducting an investigation that included more than 60 depositions before the FDIC even filed the complaint, he said.
While the FDIC has filed similar suits since, the case remains the only such jury verdict the FDIC has received.
"[The case was] unlike anything I've ever had in my career before, and I'm sure unlike anything I'll ever get again," Long said.
- Kylie Reynolds
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