In 2009 Bradley Lerman got a phone call from a former law school classmate. It was Kathleen Sullivan of the firm then called Quinn, Emanuel, Urquhart & Hedges, and she and her partner, Faith Gay, had a proposal. They told Lerman, who was chief litigation counsel at Pfizer Inc., that they had noticed that his company had a case on appeal involving the Alien Tort Statute.
In recent years, plaintiffs have sued under that statute to try to hold corporations responsible for human rights abuses abroad. Sullivan and Gay knew a lot about that controversial law from successfully representing The Coca-Cola Company in two ATS cases, and asked Lerman if they could come by and spend 30 minutes talking to him. Lerman hadn’t used Quinn Emanuel before, but he said sure.
