James D. Zirin
Encyclopedia
James D. Zirin, a leading trial and appellate lawyer, writer and cable TV talk show host, is a partner in the New York office of Sidley Austin
LLP. For three years, he was an Assistant United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York and served in the criminal division under Robert M. Morgenthau
.
Zirin has appeared in state and federal courts around the nation. His practice has featured the defense of major accounting firms charged with violations of professional responsibility and in substantial class actions. These matters have included the American Express salad oil and Equity Funding cases where he represented Deloitte Haskins & Sells, and the IOS and DeLorean litigations. His clients have also included the Rockefeller Foundation
, Merrill Lynch
, Citibank
, Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts
, and the City of New York. He represented a Brazilian trader who was a significant figure in the silver debacle of 1979 and 1980. He has handled white collar criminal cases, shareholders’ litigation, patent infringement and directors and officers liability cases. His experience includes litigation involving reinsurance on the London market, arbitration and alternate dispute resolution.
He recovered over $100 million in cash and property for Armco in its requirements contract litigation with Allied Chemical. He has appeared in major estates litigation, most notably the litigation involving the Estate of Mark Rothko
, the estate of William S. Todman as well as the litigation involving the estate of the widow of the expressionist artist, Max Beckmann
. He served as an arbitrator in the complex disputes involving the limited partnership owning the Helmsley Palace Hotel. He successfully represented a take-over target against a $90 million claim for a break-up fee, and the City of New York in resisting a class action seeking over $2 billion, in connection with investments made by the Teachers’ Retirement System. He recovered a large judgment for a placement agent against a substantial private equity fund
after the fund appealed unsuccessfully to the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit
and the United States Supreme Court.
James D. Zirin has written over 100 op-ed articles for Forbes, Barron’s
, the LA Times, The Times
, The Washington Times
, the New York Sun
and the New York Law Journal
on legal, political and foreign policy subjects/ He is co-host with James Goodale of the weekly prime time cable television program The Digital Age
where he has interviewed such guests as Governor Thomas Kean
, Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly, Ambassador Frank Wisner
, Princeton Dean Anne-Marie Slaughter
and New York Times Technology Columnist David Pogue
. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations
, The Economic Club of New York
and the executive committee of the Pilgrims of the United States. In August 2003, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg appointed him to the New York City Commission to Combat Police Corruption.
He is a Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers
, the chair of its International Law Committee and a past chair of its Alternatives for Dispute Resolution Committee; a member of the advisory board of the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs
at Princeton University
; a trustee of New York Law School
; and a member of the Consolidated Corporate Fund Leadership Committee of the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts
. He is a member of the Board of Editors of the New York Law Journal. He is listed in “Who’s Who in America.”
A graduate of Princeton University
with honors, Zirin received his law degree from the University of Michigan Law School
where he was an editor of the Michigan Law Review
and a member of the Order of the Coif
. He is married to Marlene Hess and has two children.
Sidley Austin
Sidley Austin LLP, formerly known as Sidley Austin Brown & Wood LLP, is one of the oldest law firms in the world. It is the sixth-largest U.S.-based corporate law firm with more than 1,650 lawyers, annual revenues of more than one billion dollars, and offices in 17 cities worldwide, with the most...
LLP. For three years, he was an Assistant United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York and served in the criminal division under Robert M. Morgenthau
Robert M. Morgenthau
Robert Morris Morgenthau is an American lawyer. From 1975 until his retirement in 2009, he was the District Attorney for New York County, the borough of Manhattan.-Early life:...
.
Zirin has appeared in state and federal courts around the nation. His practice has featured the defense of major accounting firms charged with violations of professional responsibility and in substantial class actions. These matters have included the American Express salad oil and Equity Funding cases where he represented Deloitte Haskins & Sells, and the IOS and DeLorean litigations. His clients have also included the Rockefeller Foundation
Rockefeller Foundation
The Rockefeller Foundation is a prominent philanthropic organization and private foundation based at 420 Fifth Avenue, New York City. The preeminent institution established by the six-generation Rockefeller family, it was founded by John D. Rockefeller , along with his son John D. Rockefeller, Jr...
, Merrill Lynch
Merrill Lynch
Merrill Lynch is the wealth management division of Bank of America. With over 15,000 financial advisors and $2.2 trillion in client assets it is the world's largest brokerage. Formerly known as Merrill Lynch & Co., Inc., prior to 2009 the firm was publicly owned and traded on the New York...
, Citibank
Citibank
Citibank, a major international bank, is the consumer banking arm of financial services giant Citigroup. Citibank was founded in 1812 as the City Bank of New York, later First National City Bank of New York...
, Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts
Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts
Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts is a complex of buildings in the Lincoln Square neighborhood of New York City's Upper West Side. Reynold Levy has been its president since 2002.-History and facilities:...
, and the City of New York. He represented a Brazilian trader who was a significant figure in the silver debacle of 1979 and 1980. He has handled white collar criminal cases, shareholders’ litigation, patent infringement and directors and officers liability cases. His experience includes litigation involving reinsurance on the London market, arbitration and alternate dispute resolution.
He recovered over $100 million in cash and property for Armco in its requirements contract litigation with Allied Chemical. He has appeared in major estates litigation, most notably the litigation involving the Estate of Mark Rothko
Mark Rothko
Mark Rothko, born Marcus Rothkowitz , was a Russian-born American painter. He is classified as an abstract expressionist, although he himself rejected this label, and even resisted classification as an "abstract painter".- Childhood :Mark Rothko was born in Dvinsk, Vitebsk Province, Russian...
, the estate of William S. Todman as well as the litigation involving the estate of the widow of the expressionist artist, Max Beckmann
Max Beckmann
Max Beckmann was a German painter, draftsman, printmaker, sculptor, and writer. Although he is classified as an Expressionist artist, he rejected both the term and the movement...
. He served as an arbitrator in the complex disputes involving the limited partnership owning the Helmsley Palace Hotel. He successfully represented a take-over target against a $90 million claim for a break-up fee, and the City of New York in resisting a class action seeking over $2 billion, in connection with investments made by the Teachers’ Retirement System. He recovered a large judgment for a placement agent against a substantial private equity fund
Private equity fund
A private equity fund is a collective investment scheme used for making investments in various equity securities according to one of the investment strategies associated with private equity....
after the fund appealed unsuccessfully to the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit
United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit
The United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit is a federal court with appellate jurisdiction over the district courts for the following districts:* District of Delaware* District of New Jersey...
and the United States Supreme Court.
James D. Zirin has written over 100 op-ed articles for Forbes, Barron’s
Barron's Magazine
Barron's is an American weekly newspaper covering U.S. financial information, market developments, and relevant statistics. Each issue provides a wrap-up of the previous week's market activity, news reports, and an informative outlook on the week to come....
, the LA Times, The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
, The Washington Times
The Washington Times
The Washington Times is a daily broadsheet newspaper published in Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States. It was founded in 1982 by Unification Church founder Sun Myung Moon, and until 2010 was owned by News World Communications, an international media conglomerate associated with the...
, the New York Sun
New York Sun
The New York Sun was a weekday daily newspaper published in New York City from 2002 to 2008. When it debuted on April 16, 2002, adopting the name, motto, and masthead of an otherwise unrelated earlier New York paper, The Sun , it became the first general-interest broadsheet newspaper to be started...
and the New York Law Journal
New York Law Journal
The New York Law Journal, founded in 1888, is a legal periodical covering the legal profession in New York, United States. The newspaper covers legal news, decisions, court calendars, and legislation, and provides analysis and insight in columns written by leading professionals...
on legal, political and foreign policy subjects/ He is co-host with James Goodale of the weekly prime time cable television program The Digital Age
The Digital Age
This page refers to a television program. For the period of human development, see Digital AgeThe Digital Age TV program hosted by James Goodale, formerly Vice Chairman of The New York Times, is a weekly discussion TV show much like Richard Heffner's the Open Mind.Recent guests have included...
where he has interviewed such guests as Governor Thomas Kean
Thomas Kean
Thomas Howard Kean is an American Republican Party politician, who served as the 48th Governor of New Jersey from 1982 to 1990. Kean is best known globally, however, for his 2002 appointment as Chairman of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, widely known as the...
, Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly, Ambassador Frank Wisner
Frank Wisner
Frank Gardiner Wisner was head of Office of Strategic Services operations in southeastern Europe at the end of World War II, and the head of the Directorate of Plans of the Central Intelligence Agency during the 1950s....
, Princeton Dean Anne-Marie Slaughter
Anne-Marie Slaughter
Anne-Marie Slaughter was the Director of Policy Planning for the U.S. State Department from January 2009 until February 2011. She is the Bert G...
and New York Times Technology Columnist David Pogue
David Pogue
David Welch Pogue is an American technology writer, technology columnist and commentator. He is a personal technology columnist for the New York Times, an Emmy-winning tech correspondent for CBS News Sunday Morning, weekly tech correspondent for CNBC, and a columnist for Scientific American...
. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations
Council on Foreign Relations
The Council on Foreign Relations is an American nonprofit nonpartisan membership organization, publisher, and think tank specializing in U.S. foreign policy and international affairs...
, The Economic Club of New York
The Economic Club of New York
The Economic Club of New York is a non-profit and non-partisan membership organization located in New York City and founded in 1907. Its stated purpose is the promotion of the study and discussion of social, economic, and political questions....
and the executive committee of the Pilgrims of the United States. In August 2003, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg appointed him to the New York City Commission to Combat Police Corruption.
He is a Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers
American College of Trial Lawyers
The American College of Trial Lawyers is a professional association of trial lawyers from the United States and Canada. Founded in 1950, the College is dedicated to maintaining and improving the standards of trial practice, the administration of justice and the ethics of the profession...
, the chair of its International Law Committee and a past chair of its Alternatives for Dispute Resolution Committee; a member of the advisory board of the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs
Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs
The Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs is a professional public policy school at Princeton University. The school has granted undergraduate A.B. degrees since 1930 and graduate degrees since 1948...
at Princeton University
Princeton University
Princeton University is a private research university located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League, and is one of the nine Colonial Colleges founded before the American Revolution....
; a trustee of New York Law School
New York Law School
New York Law School is a private law school in the TriBeCa neighborhood of Lower Manhattan in New York City. New York Law School is one of the oldest independent law schools in the United States. The school is located within four blocks of all major courts in Manhattan. In 2011, New York Law School...
; and a member of the Consolidated Corporate Fund Leadership Committee of the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts
Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts
Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts is a complex of buildings in the Lincoln Square neighborhood of New York City's Upper West Side. Reynold Levy has been its president since 2002.-History and facilities:...
. He is a member of the Board of Editors of the New York Law Journal. He is listed in “Who’s Who in America.”
A graduate of Princeton University
Princeton University
Princeton University is a private research university located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League, and is one of the nine Colonial Colleges founded before the American Revolution....
with honors, Zirin received his law degree from the University of Michigan Law School
University of Michigan Law School
The University of Michigan Law School is the law school of the University of Michigan, in Ann Arbor. Founded in 1859, the school has an enrollment of about 1,200 students, most of whom are seeking Juris Doctor or Master of Laws degrees, although the school also offers a Doctor of Juridical...
where he was an editor of the Michigan Law Review
Michigan Law Review
The Michigan Law Review is an American law reviews established in 1902, after Gustavus Ohlinger, a student in the Law Department of the University of Michigan, approached the Dean with a proposal for a law journal. The Michigan Law Review was originally intended as a forum in which the faculty of...
and a member of the Order of the Coif
Order of the Coif
The Order of the Coif is an honor society for United States law school graduates. A student at an American law school who earns a Juris Doctor degree and graduates in the top 10 percent of his or her class is eligible for membership if the student's law school has a chapter of the...
. He is married to Marlene Hess and has two children.