Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner

Business & Commercial Disputes

Partner - Litigation and Investigations

Dan has over a decade of experience in both trial and appellate litigation. His work includes matters involving complex commercial, environmental, administrative and employment law, energy sector and oil and gas disputes, financial institution and investment fund litigation, and corporate governance shareholder claims. He has appeared and argued in state and federal courts, the New York Public Service Commission, private arbitration tribunals, and various regulatory agencies. In class action and mass action matters, he has worked on “both sides of the v,” bringing the benefit of his familiarity with the other sides’ anticipated next moves when defending corporate clients.

Dan has experience serving as briefing and appellate preservation counsel in high-stakes, bet-the-company litigation, including in one of the most-watched patent infringement trials of 2018 (concerning 3D metal printing technology). He has handled or assisted in many appeals from trial verdicts, dispositive motion rulings, and class certification decisions. Clients value his strategic input and role in refining arguments to advance each case, through highest-quality briefing, argument presentation, and witness preparation to build the best record possible for the inevitable appeal.

Dan’s significant appellate experience includes:

An emergency First Circuit appeal to preserve a stay of creditor litigation pending negotiations of a restructuring plan of public debt obligations under the Puerto Rico Oversight, Management, and Economic Stability Act; An en banc review in the 11th Circuit on the question of whether to overturn circuit precedent on the application of judicial estoppel in bankruptcy proceedings; A 4th Circuit appeal to preserve an order dismissing a consumer mass tort litigation against a carmaker based on alleged misrepresentations about mileage; A 2nd Circuit appeal establishing the court’s leading precedent on the extraterritorial reach of the civil RICO statute; and, Authoring a Supreme Court amicus brief on behalf of the Brennan Center for Justice defending the full counting of mail-in ballots in Pennsylvania following the 2020 election.

Dan also regularly advises clients on current and expected changes in the law with potential liability considerations, through legal analysis of potential or recent lawmaking, agency proposed rulemaking, and financial and energy market trends. Most recently, he has presented analyses and presentations on litigation risks arising from several emerging trends in markets and the law. Those include the rise of ESG financing in 2020 and 2021 and anticipated regulatory actions in response, recent Supreme Court decisions concerning clients’ potential exposure to state-law “climate tort” claims seeking damages or injunctive relief for historic carbon emissions, and toxic tort liabilities in litigation over PFAS chemical contamination.

Prior to joining BCLP, Dan worked as of counsel for a global litigation firm. Most notably in this role, Dan guided large teams of lawyers on multi-billion dollar cases at every stage of litigation, from pleading, to discovery and summary judgment, to trial, and again on appeal. He is known for “reading the room” in the courtroom or at deposition and for tailoring his oral argument and witness questioning to effectively persuade judges or elicit answers from witnesses. In all of Dan’s matters, he has built the trust of clients through his candid advice, rigorous analysis, judgment, and adept execution of cases from the outset to build a strong record and develop compelling arguments through trial and appeal.

Dan clerked for the Honorable F. Dennis Saylor IV of the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts and for the Honorable Susan P. Graber of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. ​

CLERKSHIPS

Clerkship, Honorable Susan P. Graber, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, 2012-2013

Clerkship, Honorable F. Dennis Saylor IV, U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts, 2011-2012