"Can two women with backgrounds in criminal law turn around and win commercial lawsuits against big white shoe law firms?" Keller said. "The answer is yes. Emphatically yes."
A year and a half ago, the commercial litigation firm began to take on white-collar criminal defense, class actions, intellectual property and bad faith. Keller Rackauckas started with the two founding partners but has grown to nine attorneys, with two more joining soon, and six legal employees. Some attorneys come from national and international firms such as Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe LLP and Morgan, Lewis & Bockius LLP.
"People see opportunity here," Keller said. "They see opportunity in different ways. Opportunity to get in the courtroom. Opportunity to grow into an important role in a firm that's young and will need leaders in the future. Opportunity for a young attorney who wants to play a major role in big cases with big stakes."
Keller, a former deputy public defender, tried her first civil case in 2001. Rackauckas, a former Orange County deputy district attorney, tried her first civil case in 2012. Both have tried over 100 cases each and said they realized their criminal defense background still applies to trying any case in the courtroom, a skill many lawyers at large firms lack.
"We like to think of ourselves as old-fashioned barristers where we can try any type of case when someone's company or livelihood is on the line," Rackauckas said.
In 2011, Keller was lead counsel and Rackauckas worked on the trial team in the infamous battle between Barbie and Bratz dolls. Their client MGA Entertainment Inc. was accused of copyright infringement and trade secret misappropriation by Mattel Inc., the maker of Barbie. Keller led MGA Entertainment to win over $137 million in attorney fees, a judgment that remained after Mattel appealed. Bryant, et al. v. Mattel Inc., et al., CV04-9049 (C.D. Cal., filed Nov. 2, 2004).
Two years before the doll wars, Keller and Rackauckas won their first plaintiff business fraud case to the tune of a $350 million judgment, the largest business jury verdict of the year. Auerbach Acquisition Associates Inc. v. Daily, et al., BC285134 (L.A. Super. Ct., filed Nov. 13, 2002).
Their courtroom victories sparked requests for them to take cases at the start rather than jumping in before they went to trial, leading to the formation of the firm, which now counts MGA Entertainment, Standard & Poor's and American International Group Inc. as key clients.
"Together, we make a pretty formidable duo," Keller said. "We wanted to show a women-owned firm can play with the big boys."
Though the firm merged with Umberg Zipser LLP for eight months in 2013, Keller Rackauckas has no future plans for another marriage.
"We're comfortable with each other," Rackauckas said. "We like our team the way it is. We never had a disagreement about the business like what cases to take and what cases not to take."
Keller, a mother of a law clerk who recently graduated from UCLA School of Law, and Rackauckas, a mother of a 13-year-old son, say they get phone calls all the time from female law students and sometimes mentor them over lunch.
"It's satisfying to prove women can achieve what we have," Keller said. "I know there are young women lawyers who are inspired by our example, because they tell me so."
- Kibkabe Araya
#304357
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