Hashish litigation isn’t for the faint of coronary heart. The business’s challenges may be distinctive, even in commonplace enterprise areas like employment regulation, insurance coverage claims, mental property, and contract disputes. Challenges develop into magnified in federal courts, the place the Managed Substances Act—beneath which hashish stays an unlawful substance—limits the sorts of instances which may be heard.
Litigation in state and native courts is equally troublesome. Companies face what the American Bar Affiliation described as “a extremely advanced authorized and regulatory panorama” with conflicting legal guidelines and nascent pointers that fluctuate throughout state strains.
For hashish firms, the optimum method is to construct a strong authorized basis from the beginning, guaranteeing regulatory compliance whereas additionally creating and recurrently reviewing safeguards to cut back the danger of authorized legal responsibility sooner or later. Involving a cannabis-savvy lawyer will pay dividends on this entrance.
However what occurs if, regardless of your greatest efforts, a courtroom battle turns into unavoidable? Discovering a litigator with deep information of hashish regulation could make all of the distinction.
This checklist displays lots of the prime United States-based litigators within the business right now. These attorneys have secured favorable courtroom rulings, settlements, and arbitration outcomes for shoppers starting from massive multistate operators to scrappy startups and small household companies. The attorneys on this checklist have confirmed themselves extremely competent, educated, and tenacious when representing their shoppers in courtroom, arbitration, or different authorized dealings. All are skilled in cannabis-related litigation.
Cara Thornton
Licensed in Colorado
Apply areas: enterprise and industrial litigation, mental property and trademark litigation, actual property litigation, white-collar prison protection, employment and labor, common company advisement
Alma mater: College of Tennessee School of Legislation
Arduous info: Thornton is an skilled litigator with a observe targeted on advanced industrial litigation together with mental property, enterprise torts, hashish regulation, actual property, and different business-related disputes. She has notched a number of current wins for the agency’s hemp shoppers. Thornton additionally serves as outdoors common counsel for company shoppers. In July 2022, she was named an fairness companion at Fortis Legislation.
Irina Dashevsky
Licensed in Illinois
Apply areas: licensing, actual property, regulatory compliance and protection, class motion protection, monetary providers
Alma mater: Loyola College Chicago College of Legislation
Arduous info: In 2021, Dashevsky earned a spot on Law360’s extremely aggressive Rising Stars list primarily based partly on her work representing would-be dispensary homeowners towards the State of Illinois over the state’s licensing course of. She is a sought-after useful resource for her information of the quickly evolving U.S. business, significantly in Illinois and New York. As well as, Dashevsky is a frequent contributor to commerce publications and a preferred panelist and speaker at business gatherings.
Megan Dubatowka
Harris St. Laurent & Wechsler LLP
Licensed in New York, New Jersey
Apply areas: employment litigation and counseling, industrial litigation
Alma mater: Brooklyn Legislation College
Arduous info: As a companion at Harris St. Laurent & Wechsler, Dubatowka represents firms in courtroom and through high-stakes Monetary Trade Regulatory Authority and Judicial Arbitration and Mediation Companies arbitration. She lately efficiently second-chaired an arbitration case for a number one California testing lab, and he or she has secured tens of millions of {dollars} in awards for shoppers in different instances. Dubatowka is thought for listening and tailoring her method to every consumer’s distinctive circumstances and her information about coming into enterprise partnerships. She earned Tremendous Attorneys’ Rising Star designation for 2017–2022.
Jennifer Briggs Fisher
Licensed in California
Apply areas: strategic enterprise session, regulatory compliance with firm formation and structuring, finance, mergers and acquisitions, company governance
Alma mater: Boston School Legislation College
Arduous info: As co-chair of Goodwin’s hashish observe, Fisher is named the go-to authorized advisor for every thing from massive MSOs to rising startups. She has earned coveted spots in The Nationwide Legislation Journal’s Hashish Legislation Trailblazers, The American Lawyer’s Trailblazers West, and Hashish Legislation Report’s World Prime 200 Hashish Attorneys. Fisher additionally lately was named Hashish Lawyer of the Yr by the Hashish Dealmakers Summit and amongst The Day by day Journal’s Prime Girls Attorneys in California for 2022.
Janet E. Jackim
Licensed in Arizona, Colorado
Apply areas: restructuring and exercises, M&A, industrial actual property
Alma mater: Loyola College Chicago College of Legislation
Arduous info: Jackim brings big-company enterprise practices and authorized abilities to small and midsize companies. In 2019, she wrote substantial parts of an amicus temporary for the Arizona Supreme Courtroom within the case State of Arizona v. Jones, efficiently arguing that hashish extracts and concentrates had been protected beneath the Arizona Medical Marijuana Act. Jackim holds an AV Preeminent® Score from Martindale-Hubbell and has earned recognition as a World Prime Hashish Lawyer (2022), Authorized Leaders’ Lady Chief within the Legislation, (2021), and Actual Property Legislation’s The Greatest Attorneys in America® (2018–2019).
Kathleen M. Kline
Licensed in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York
Apply areas: industrial litigation, contract regulation, securities and derivatives, monetary providers, skilled legal responsibility
Alma mater: Columbia Legislation College
Arduous info: Kline litigates a broad vary of economic disputes, together with claims towards monetary establishments, contract and fiduciary obligation actions, securities class and spinoff actions, {and professional} legal responsibility claims. As a member of Duane Morris’s Hashish Trade Group, Kline possesses experience within the cannabis-infused beverage market throughout the nation. In 2020, they co-authored a Legislation.com commentary about craft beer tendencies, “Arduous, Hazy and Possibly Wholesome—With a Likelihood of Legal responsibility and Litigation,” that reviewed labeling and advertising and marketing concerns for CBD- and THC-infused drinks.
Esther H. Lee
Licensed in Colorado
Apply areas: industrial litigation, development, insurance coverage
Alma mater: Creighton College College of Legislation
Arduous info: Lee’s expertise spans all levels of litigation in state and federal courts, together with appeals, arbitration, case administration, and legal responsibility evaluation. In 2021, she represented a member and shareholder of a hashish firm in acquiring a $100-million award, plus attorneys’ charges, in high-stakes “bet-the-company” litigation. She earned a spot on Greatest Attorneys’ Ones to Watch checklist for industrial litigation in Denver (2021–2023), and is a member of the Management Council on Authorized Range’s 2022 Class of Pathfinders.
Meital Manzuri
Manzuri Legislation
Apply areas: litigation, company and transactional regulation, mental property, licensing, regulatory compliance
Alma mater: College of California Hastings School of the Legislation
Arduous info: One of many first hashish and hemp enterprise attorneys in California, Manzuri has efficiently litigated massive federal and state instances. She additionally has helped procure and keep greater than 200 industrial licenses and closed $25 million in transactions up to now 12 months. Manzuri gives multistate illustration of hashish companies all through the U.S. and internationally for licensing, regulatory compliance, mental property, and company governance. She lately was named one in every of The Day by day Journal’s Prime Hashish Attorneys (2022).
Allison B. Margolin
Licensed in California
Apply areas: enterprise regulation, regulatory compliance, mental property, setting and land use, federal and state prison protection
Alma mater: Harvard Legislation College
Arduous info: As “Los Angeles’s dopest lawyer,” Margolin has earned a popularity for fiercely combating on behalf of hashish customers and companies in addition to advocating for social-equity-focused rules. Her current work contains representing Hmong hashish cultivators in a high-profile case regarding native water ordinances (Lo et al v. County of Siskiyou et al). Margolin holds a longstanding spot on Thomson Reuters’ Tremendous Attorneys checklist (2018–2023) and was chosen to the Rising Stars checklist in each 2010–2012 and 2015–2017.
Sarah Lee Gossett Parrish
Sarah Lee Gossett Parrish PLLC
Licensed in Oklahoma
Apply areas: enterprise formation and licensing, compliance, regulation, M&A, administrative hearings and appeals
Alma mater: College of Oklahoma School of Legislation
Arduous info: Parrish possesses greater than thirty years’ expertise as a civil litigator, incomes a number of accolades within the hashish area. In 2019, she was named one in every of thirty Hashish Trailblazers by The Nationwide Legislation Journal, the one Oklahoman to make the checklist. Different recognition contains Hashish Legislation Report’s World Prime 200 Hashish Attorneys (2021–2023) and The Journal Document’s Prime Hashish Enterprise Legislation Agency within the State of Oklahoma for 3 years operating. Parrish additionally acquired Martindale-Hubbel’s highest AV Preeminent® ranking for peer and judicial overview.
Jerrico Perez
Licensed in Colorado, Texas
Apply areas: litigation, arbitration, administrative regulation, worldwide transactions, licensing, regulatory compliance
Alma mater: College of Denver Sturm School of Legislation
Arduous info: Perez represents shoppers in state and native hearings, negotiating and resolving regulatory disciplinary actions in addition to interesting and searching for judicial overview of ultimate company actions. She has guided shoppers in a number of aggressive and noncompetitive license utility processes in Colorado, Ohio, Hawaii, California, Maryland, and Canada. In 2022, she was named one in every of Denver’s Prime Attorneys by 5280 journal, and he or she has been acknowledged as a Greatest Attorneys’ One to Watch since 2021. Perez grew to become companion at Vicente Sederberg in January 2022.
Ruth A. Rauls
Licensed in New Jersey, New York
Apply areas: litigation, labor and employment regulation
Alma mater: Rutgers Legislation College
Arduous info: Rauls advises shoppers on office insurance policies, practices, and procedures, together with medical use and drug-testing insurance policies. She serves on the manager committee of the New Jersey State Bar Affiliation Hashish Legislation Committee (2018–current) and as co-chair of the NJSBA Legislation Committee’s Labor and Employment Subcommittee (2021–current). Rauls lately was named one in every of NJBIZ’s 2022 Leaders in Legislation and has been acknowledged by Benchmark Litigation as a Labor & Employment Star and Future Star in 2022. She additionally earned a spot on the Govt Girls of New Jersey’s 2022 Trailblazing Coverage Makers Checklist.
Kristin Westphal
Licensed in California, Arizona
Apply areas: civil litigation, partnership disputes, contract points, enterprise regulation, development regulation, logos, dispute decision
Alma mater: College of Arizona James E. Rogers School of Legislation
Arduous info: Westphal represents a variety of shoppers in retail, cultivation, manufacturing, and startups, efficiently litigating all sorts of enterprise disputes. At all times up for a problem, she has developed a specialty in acquiring injunctions for her shoppers in partnership disputes to forestall shareholders from being squeezed out or taken benefit of by their companions. Whereas Westphal calls California house, she retains her finger on the heartbeat of tendencies and rising markets in different states because the business continues to develop.