Thomas J. Nolan

When Nolan joined 15-lawyer Pearson, Simon & Warshaw LLP on Jan. 1, 2020, it felt like a new beginning.

"I was getting back to my roots," after decades at big firms, he said. "I started my own white collar boutique back in 1979, Miller & Nolan. We did white collar criminal defense before I ran off to join the circus."

Nolan spent years doing criminal law as a federal prosecutor in Los Angeles and as a criminal defender at his own firm and at the firm known now as Howrey LLP. There, in 1996, he recalled, he was assigned the first civil case of his career: an antitrust claim for client Litton Industries Inc. against Honeywell International Inc. over the alleged monopolization of an aircraft guidance device.

He won some $800 million, including $40 million in attorney fees. "Not bad for my first civil case, as I frequently tell people," Nolan said.

Nolan's avowed purpose for moving to Pearson Simon from Latham & Watkins LLP and, earlier, Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP and Affiliates, was simple: "I wanted to get back into the courtroom," he said in January. Unfortunately for that plan, courtrooms soon closed due to coronavirus safety concerns. "It's like when I invest in the stock market and the market falls, I blame myself," he said with a laugh. "Sounds narcissistic, but I feel the same way here. All my fault."

Not that litigation has ceased, even with courtrooms dark. At the end of April, Chief Magistrate Judge Joseph C. Spero of San Francisco dismissed Pearson Simon's antitrust complaint against the Oakland Raiders and the National Football League over the team's decision to relocate from California to Las Vegas, Nevada. "We contend that the team and the league engaged in unfair competition and monopolization activities that resulted in injury and loss to the city," Nolan said. The client is the City of Oakland. "The judge believes we failed to allege antitrust violations, but we are taking our appeal to the 9th Circuit. City of Oakland v. Oakland Raiders, 3:18-cv-07444 (N.D. Cal., filed Dec. 11, 2018).

More encouraging were recent developments the firm's antitrust claims against the producers of broiler chickens. The plaintiffs are restaurant companies and other poultry buyers who accuse major chicken farms--including Tyson Foods Inc., Pilgrim's Pride Corp., Koch Foods Inc., Sanderson Farms Inc., Foster Farms LLC, Purdue Farms Inc. and others--of illegally coordinating operations to inflate prices.

In early June federal prosecutors criminally indicted some of the same industry executives named in the civil litigation. In re: Broiler Chicken Antitrust Litigation, 1:16-cv-08637 (N.D. Ill., filed Sept. 2, 2016).

The indictments added momentum to the plaintiffs' case and may have been a government effort to encourage whistleblowers to come forward in similar cases, Nolan said.

-- John Roemer