J. Peter Coll

Peter Coll is the senior member of the firm's Litigation Group in New York. He is also a member of the Firm's Executive Committee. He is known for his ability to help clients develop litigation strategies that meet both their case-specific and business objectives.

Mr. Coll has tried major, complex cases in New York state and federal courts and throughout the United States, including Washington, the Virgin Islands, California and Arizona. During his 30-year litigation and trial career, he has argued appeals before the United States Supreme Court, the highest-level appellate courts of New York and New Jersey, and seven federal circuit courts of appeal.

Mr. Coll has represented Fortune 500 companies, such as American Cyanamid Company, The Dow Chemical Company, American Home Products Corporation, Mead Corporation, Alleghany Corporation and Schering-Plough Corporation. He has also represented privately held companies and individuals, including high-profile clients like Mickey Mantle. Mr. Coll's cases have involved general commercial, antitrust, securities fraud, mergers and acquisitions, product liability, federal taxation, ERISA, consumer fraud and intellectual property (including patent and trademark claims). The following are examples of his notable cases:

• The Mead Corporation. In June 2001, Mr. Coll won a victory for The Mead Corporation in the landmark United States Supreme Court decision United States v. Mead Corp., No. 99-1434. The government brought the appeal from a Federal Circuit ruling that the United States Customs Service had been unreasonable in changing its classification of Mead's "day planners" from a duty-free classification to a four percent-tariff classification. The government argued that under existing Supreme Court precedent, the Federal Circuit should have given Customs' classification the force and effect of law. But Orrick convinced the Supreme Court to hold that courts cannot reflexively grant "controlling weight" deference to an agency's interpretation of the law that the agency is charged to administer, and rather, that courts are to give the agency's interpretation "a respect proportionate 'to its power to persuade.'" The Mead decision will have a far-reaching effect on the government party to an administrative action or litigation more leeway to challenge the agency’s position.
• Williamson, Trustee v. PricewaterhouseCoopers.  The New York Court of Appeals on June 7th, 2007, unanimously reversed a three-to-two intermediate appellate court decision that would have allowed the statute of limitations on accounting malpractice claims to be tolled by the accountant's engagements to perform similar audit services in subsequent years.  The case, which was argued on PricewaterhouseCoopers' (PwC) behalf by Mr. Coll, presented the Court of Appeals with its first opportunity to determine the applicability of the continuous representation doctrine in the accounting context and will have an immediate and far-reaching impact for accounting firms facing malpractice claims in New York.  It is now settled that the statute of limitations will begin running upon the delivery of the auditor's report and will not be tolled by continuous professional relationship.

• Talley Industries. In TRW v. Talley Industries, a complex intellectual property action in the United States District Court for the District of Arizona, Mr. Coll obtained a US$138 million jury verdict for Arizona-based Talley Industries. Subsequently, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed this verdict. A preliminary injunction obtained in the action, and then affirmed on appeal to the Ninth Circuit, was novel in that it required TRW to make seven-figure royalty payments each quarter to Talley during the course of the litigation. In total, approximately US$200 million was recovered for Talley.

• DTP Vaccine Litigation. Mr. Coll served as national counsel for Lederle Laboratories in DTP vaccine actions. In that role, Mr. Coll represented Lederle before the Supreme Court of New Jersey in Shackil v. Lederle Laboratories. In Shackil, the New Jersey Court rejected all theories of collective liability with respect to all childhood vaccines. For this same client, Mr. Coll has litigated other pharmaceutical products cases involving complex scientific, legal and procedural issues. He has tried actions involving oral polio and tetanus toxoid vaccines to successful conclusions in both state and federal courts in Plummer v. Lederle Laboratories and Samuels v. American Cyanamid Co. Mr. Coll has had other notable success in the pharmaceutical products liability arena including in the Third Circuit Wade-Greaux v. Whitehall Laboratories (Third Circuit affirmance of dismissal of case, after evidentiary hearing, because of "junk science") and Tenuto vs. Lederle Laboratories (learned intermediary rule reaffirmed by the New York Court of Appeals).

Before joining Orrick, Mr. Coll was a partner at Donovan Leisure Newton & Irvine, LLP (1976-1998), where he served as Chairman of its Executive Committee.

Admitted in

• New York

Court Admissions

• Eighth Circuit
• Federal Circuit
• Fifth Circuit
• First Circuit
• Ninth Circuit
• Second Circuit
• Third Circuit

• Eastern District of New York
• Northern District of New York
• Southern District of New York
• Western District of New York

Memberships

• American Bar Association
• New York State Bar Association
• Association of the Bar of the City of New York
• New York County Lawyers’ Association
• Federal Bar Council

Multimedia

Publications

• "Selection of Experts, Expert Disclosure and Pretrial Exclusion of Expert Testimony," Commercial Litigation in New York State Courts 2nd ed., West 2005 and Supp. 2006.
• "Use of Demonstrative Evidence During Trial," Preparing and Trying the Civil Lawsuit, N.Y.S.B.A. 1987 and Supp. 1997.
• "Preparing a Challenge to the Admissibility of Expert Testimony in the Federal and State Courts of New York," Products Liability in New York 2nd ed., NYSBA 2004.