Kasey J. Curtis

Curtis, who made partner at Reed Smith LLP earlier this year, has already made an impact on the California legal landscape in cases involving ranging from the state's Private Attorney General Act to the federal Fair Debt Collection Practices Act.

Just last year, he argued a case setting important precedent on what plaintiffs need to do before pursuing PAGA claims.

The widely litigated law requires litigants to exhaust administrative resources before suing employers for labor violations.

Representing Ralphs Grocery Co., Curtis successfully urged a California appeals court to rule plaintiffs must inform the Labor and Workforce Development Agency of all "facts and theories" relevant to a claim, instead of just outlining alleged violations of the state's labor code. Brown v. Ralphs Grocery Co., 28 Cal. App. 5th 824 (2018)

"The law wasn't very settled and very developed," Curtis said, describing the precedent that will be beneficial to corporate defendants. "It was a grassroots effort to go through the legislate history...to come up with a way to substantiate a position that might not otherwise have been developed."

A former clerk to 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Johnnie B. Rawlinson, Curtis has been a rising star in Reed Smith's appellate group for several years.

As an associate, he briefed a case that established a circuit split on the scope of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act that was resolved by the nation's high court just this last term.

Representing a financial services company ensnared in a thorny dispute over its role as a trustee in a real estate deal, Curtis laid out an argument that efforts taken to facilitate non-judicial foreclosure are not debt collection attempts under the FDCPA.

Curtis, and former Reed Smith partner Margaret M. Grignon, were waging a battle uphill. The 4th and 6th U.S. Circuit Courts of Appeal had already weighed in on the issue, concluding differently from Curtis.

The Reed Smith team prevailed and the 9th Circuit ultimately sided with Curtis' client, forcing a split on the issue. Ho v. ReconTrust Company, N.A., 858 F.3d 568 (9th Cir. 2017)

Earlier this year, in an unrelated case, the U.S. Supreme Court justices adopted the 9th Circuit's reading of the law. Obsudskey v. McCarthy & Holthus, LLP, 139 S. Ct. 1029 (2019)

"It was an interesting experience because we started with several circuits against us and nothing on our side, but were able to change the sway of things," Curtis said.

-- Nicolas Sonnenburg