Hecker Fink LLP

Commercial Litigation; Education; Employment, Discrimination and Sexual Misconduct; Investigations and Crisis Management; Public Interest Litigation; Regulatory Enforcement and Litigation; Securities Enforcement and Litigation

Partner

Kate L. Doniger is a partner at Hecker Fink LLP.

Kate represents companies, financial institutions and individuals in complex civil litigation, internal investigations, and criminal and regulatory enforcement matters.

Kate maintains a wide-ranging commercial litigation practice that includes contract and employment disputes, securities litigation and class actions. Kate also advises clients in matters concerning allegations of harassment and discrimination. Kate has substantial experience representing individual and corporate clients in regulatory proceedings and related litigation, including in matters before the Securities and Exchange Commission, Department of Justice, Commodity Futures Trading Commission, and various exchanges and self-regulatory organizations. These matters have included, among other things, alleged securities and commodities fraud, insider trading, money laundering and accounting fraud.

In addition, Kate helps corporate clients navigate sensitive internal and government-led investigations and assess and strengthen their compliance programs. She has guided clients through all aspects of the investigations and crisis management process, from conducting internal investigations to advising on public disclosures and revising corporate policies, procedures and practices. In a recent high-profile matter, Kate was part of the team that conducted a lengthy investigation into gender equity issues at the NCAA. That investigation resulted in two in-depth reports, which have led to significant changes in Division I men’s and women’s basketball and other NCAA sports.

Kate maintains an active pro bono practice and has played a lead role in many of the firm’s public interest matters, including the firm’s representation of a survivor of Jeffrey Epstein’s abuse in a lawsuit against his estate, a Second Circuit appeal concerning the New York Board of Parole officials’ entitlement to immunity for their imposition of unconstitutional conditions of post-release supervision, and the firm’s recent challenge to Florida House Bill 1557 (widely known as the “Don’t Say Gay” law).

Kate is a member of Hecker Fink's diversity and inclusion committee and is active in its recruitment and professional development programs. She was honored by the National LGBT Bar Association & Foundation as one of its 2020 Best LGBTQ+ Lawyers Under 40.  She is also the firm’s 2022 Fellow to the Leadership Council on Legal Diversity.

Kate is a graduate of the New York University School of Law, where she was a Notes Editor on the Law Review. Prior to law school, she worked for the Center for Court Innovation as Deputy Director of the Red Hook Community Justice Center, the nation’s first multi-jurisdictional community court. Kate holds a M.P.A. in Public and Nonprofit Management and Policy from New York University and a B.A. from Barnard College.

B.A., Barnard College, 2004 cum laude M.P.A., Robert F. Wagner School, New York University, 2006 J.D., New York University School of Law, 2012