Chairman Emeritus and retired partner Ben Civiletti focused his practice of law on commercial litigation, banking, white-collar crime, government regulation, and corporate governance. He conducted numerous product liability cases; successfully prosecuted and defended statutory and constitutional claims, and conducted special investigations growing out of derivative suits, governmental proceedings, and a state impeachment resolution. Ben is both a trial and appellate advocate. In addition, he developed a practice in alternative dispute resolution, working successfully as a mediator, facilitator, master and arbitrator in many commercial and tort disputes to achieve faster and more cost-efficient justice.
Ben's prior service on four public for-profit boards and three non-profit boards afforded him a thorough familiarity with corporate governance consensus, task forces, and strategic planning. As Attorney General of the United States, Ben argued before the International Court of Justice on behalf of the American captives in Iran, and before the Supreme Court for the right of the government to denaturalize Nazi war criminals, and successfully defended the President's wage and price guidelines in the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit (sitting en banc). Furthermore, Ben was responsible for the Justice Department's promulgation of open trial guidelines, the Stanford Daily laws, the development and publication of National Priorities for the Investigation and Prosecution of White-Collar Crime, Principles of Federal Prosecution, National Prison Standards, and a score of other improvements in the effective enforcement of criminal law and in civil rights and environmental protection.