Biography

Scott Greenspan is a seasoned commercial, insurance coverage and products liability litigator.  Throughout his career, he has represented a host of large corporations in contractual disputes, franchise disputes, electronic discovery disputes, employment disputes, real estate litigation, intellectual property disputes, defamation disputes, bankruptcy disputes, lending disputes, and advertising industry disputes. 

As a member of the firm’s Insurance Industry Team, Mr. Greenspan represents insurers in a host of coverage matters involving many different types of insurance policies and claims. Mr. Greenspan is best-known for litigating large insurance coverage and commercial disputes.

Scott Greenspan served for over two years as national litigation coordinating counsel to a publicly traded specialty financial company which is the nation's largest provider of financing and advertising in the taxicab industry. In that capacity, he served as the company's chief advisor and primary outside litigator in commercial litigation and lending cases all over the country.

Mr. Greenspan has experience in international arbitration and recently successfully represented a Latin American restaurant franchisee in an arbitration against the world's largest restaurant franchisor, garnering an award from the three-arbitrator panel that the franchisor had acted in bad faith toward the franchisee.

Mr. Greenspan is experienced in first amendment litigation and was part of a team that overturned a tax imposed by a southern state on certain types of controversial programming.  He has also represented several tobacco and medical device manufacturers in products liability litigation and a number of real estate builders and developers in toxic mold litigation.

Litigation Matters

Mr. Greenspan’s experience includes:

• Successfully tried a $100 million insurance coverage action on behalf of one of the world’s largest insurance carriers and obtained a complete defense verdict after a two month trial. Mr. Greenspan conducted the direct examination of the majority of the insurer’s witnesses and cross-examined the majority of the insured’s witnesses at the trial. The case had 65 depositions, most of which were either taken or defended by Mr. Greenspan, and involved the production and review of millions of pages of documents, which Mr. Greenspan supervised. The trial concerned whether a $150 million umbrella policy covering hospital professional liability dropped down and became primary coverage upon the exhaustion of a fully-fronted, fully-funded primary policy.
• Successfully defended one of the world’s largest insurance companies in a $65 million lawsuit concerning builders’ risk/delay-in-startup coverage for damages arising out of the collapse of a massive power plant under construction.
• Won summary judgment for major insurance carrier in a California federal district court against a $10 million duty to defend claim under a commercial general liability policy’s personal and advertising injury coverage. The claim arose from a lawsuit between two major record companies.
• Successfully defended The Walt Disney Company and its subsidiaries that own the Walt Disney World Resort in several actions brought in New York federal court, won motions to dismiss in both cases which held that the Disney entities that own The Walt Disney World Resort cannot be sued in any court in the State of New York because New York lacks personal jurisdiction over them, included the published decision of Intermor v. Walt Disney Co., 250 F. Supp. 2d 116 (E.D.N.Y. 2003).
• Represented Medallion Financial Corp., Medallion Funding Corp. and Medallion Taxi Media, Inc. in a number of commercial litigation and lending actions in states around the country, earned Medallion substantial victories in those matters.
• Represented policyholders in insurance coverage litigation matters for over seven years and recovered over $100 million for those clients. Those matters involved virtually every type of liability or property policy and concerned, among other things claims for environmental liability, property damage, business interruption, toxic tort injury, products liability, asbestos, builder's risk, September 11th-related claims, collapse claims, employment practices liability, school system liability, directors and officers and errors and omissions. Insureds represented by Mr. Greenspan in those high-stakes insurance coverage matters include two of the nation's largest airlines, two of the nation's largest airports, several of the nation's largest drug and medical device manufacturers, a number of the nation's largest real estate developers and property management companies, one of Arizona's largest school districts and one of the most expensive cooperative apartment buildings in Manhattan. Mr. Greenspan's substantial prior insured-side coverage experience gives him an invaluable perspective which he now applies to his insurer-side coverage practice at Sedgwick.
• Represented a large family of advertising and marketing companies, which included one of the nation's largest advertising agencies. Mr. Greenspan represented these advertising and marketing clients in broken mergers, employment disputes and national tobacco litigation involving advertising campaigns conducted by these clients. He successfully represented these companies in fending off burdensome requests for electronic discovery materials, including a request for all of the companies' e-mails stored on backup tapes.  
• Represented the nation's leading cable news network in a number of complex commercial litigation actions in New York courts arising from disputes between the network and some of the cable systems that carried it. Mr. Greenspan successfully resolved all of those cases for the cable network, resulting in substantial settlements.
• Defended two of the nation's major tobacco manufacturers in products liability litigation in states around the country as well as a leading manufacturer of breast implants.

Presentations & Publications

• "Second Circuit Narrows Forum-Shopping Exception to First to File Rule in Declaratory Judgment Actions," co-authored, Sedgwick’s Insurance Law Update (April 2008);
• "E-Discovery From the Trenches: A Practical, How-To Guide to Address E-Discovery and Minimize Cost and Risks," live web cast organized by Fios, Inc., September 2006;
• "Emerging Caselaw Governing the Preservation and Production of Electronic Documents - and the Consequences for Those Who Do Not Preserve and Produce Electronic Documents," Directors Roundtable, New York, NY, January 2006;
• "Emerging Caselaw Governing the Preservation and Production of Electronic Documents - and the Consequences for Those Who Do Not Preserve and Produce Electronic Documents," presented as part of Electronic Records Management & Discovery seminar cosponsored by Sedgwick and Kroll Ontrack Inc., Los Angeles, CA & San Francisco, CA, November 2005;
• "Compliance Standards for Retention and Production of Electronic Documents - Knowing the Do's and Don'ts," presentation as part of "Corporate Compliance: Do's & Don'ts" panel featured during Corporate Counsel Community Forum conference, organized by the Greater New York Chapter of the Association of Corporate Counsel and the ABA Section of Business Law's Committee on Corporate Counsel, New York, NY, November 2005;
• "Seventeen Secrets for Survival as a First-Year Associate at a Large Law Firm," New York Law Journal Magazine ("First-Year Associates" issue), September 2005;
• "Emerging Caselaw Governing the Preservation and Production of Electronic Documents - and the Consequences for Those Who Do Not Preserve and Produce Electronic Documents," Directors Roundtable, Silicon Valley, CA, Spring 2005; New York, NY, Winter 2005;
• "Cost Effective Legal Research Strategies for Commercial Litigation," WESFACCA (Westchester/Southern Connecticut Chapter of the Association of Corporate Counsel) seminar, Fall 2004; and
• "Is Toxic Mold the Next Asbestos?", seminar for major New York commercial property owners, managers and insurers, New York, NY, Fall 2002. 

Memberships & Honors

Mr. Greenspan currently is a member of the Defense Research Institute and its Insurance Law Committee. He is also currently a member of the American Bar Association and its sections on: (1) Tort and Insurance Practice; and (2) Litigation. He is also a member of the Insurance Coverage Committee of the ABA’s Section on Litigation. Mr. Greenspan is active in the ABA and has served as a judge to the ABA’s National Moot Court Competition, which simulates United States Supreme Court arguments on constitutional issues. He is also a member of the District of Columbia Bar Association.

Mr. Greenspan was appointed to the Association of the Bar of the City of New York’s Council on Judicial Administration, the leading committee for the administration of New York’s court system. He was also appointed by Manhattan Borough President Scott M. Stringer and City Council member Jessica S. Lappin to serve a two-year term (2006-2008) on Manhattan Community Board 6. Mr. Greenspan has served for four years as the president and chairman (as well as three more years as Vice President) of the Board of Directors and Board of Managers of Hawthorne Owners Corp. and the 211 East 53rd St. Condominium, which collectively constitute a large coop building on Manhattan’s East Side.