Defending Against PFAS Liability Claims: Expansive Regulation, Mitigating Client Risk, Defense Strategies

Mr. Brown’s practice focuses on environmental litigation, environmental regulation, product liability, toxic torts, ESG, and transactional due diligence. He represents clients throughout the full lifecycle of complex environmental and products liability litigations and regulatory matters. He has extensive experience addressing litigation and regulatory matters involving natural resource damages, contaminated sediments, and emerging chemicals of concern, particularly per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS). Mr. Brown has successfully defended claims in numerous federal and state courts across the country and also regularly counsels buyers, sellers, lenders, and underwriters on the full spectrum of environmental issues that may affect transactions.   

Mr. Cohen’s practice focuses on representing policyholders in obtaining insurance coverage in complex, multiparty disputes involving product liability, product recalls, cyber events, and supply chain issues. He has successfully recovered insurance proceeds on behalf of Fortune 500 and smaller companies for a broad array of consumer product risks. Mr. Cohen served as lead counsel in numerous matters involving food contamination and recall losses, Proposition 65 claims, cyber-related losses, advertising and IP claims, supply chain losses, and first-party property losses. He has also worked at the forefront of issues involving the overlap of insurance and bankruptcy, recovering billions of dollars through representations of debtors, claimant committees, a future claimant’s representative, and post-bankruptcy trusts. Mr. Cohen also represents clients in managing their business risks and advises clients with respect to insurance, indemnity agreements, and other contract-related aspects of their risk management strategies.

Mr. Weber has helped clients navigate the nuances of environmental law for over 31 years. His environmental practice is broad, encompassing related practice areas such as regulatory, administrative, zoning, and municipal. Mr. Weber's practice is three-fold: litigation, compliance, and transactions. In the litigation arena, he defends clients in state, federal, administrative, and local zoning matters, as well as multidistrict litigation and class actions. Mr. Weber's compliance practice involves permitting, environmental audits, regulatory counseling, and agency relations. His transactional work includes environmental aspects of mergers and acquisitions, real estate transactions, financing, and Brownfields agreements. Mr. Weber is a regular speaker and lecturer on emerging environmental issues such as PFAS and environmental justice, and he provides interactive training on environmental auditing, litigation performance, and legal privileges. He also routinely authors environmental publications and updates on emerging topics.