Allyn Z. Lite
Member
Two Gateway Center, 12th Floor
Newark, NJ 07102
Tel: 973.623.3000 x. 3815
Fax: 973.877.3872
ALLYN Z. LITE, the Firm's senior partner, concentrates on class action and other complex commercial litigation. He was designated by the Judges of the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey as Clerk of that Court from 1982 to 1986. While in that position, Mr. Lite created the Court's alternative dispute resolution program and served on and was Reporter for the committee that drafted the current Local Rules of the United States District Court for New Jersey. He was a member of the committee that drafted the new Rules of the United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of New Jersey, and participated as one of ten original members of the United States District Court Lawyer's Advisory Committee, on which he served for 11 years.
Mr. Lite is the author of New Jersey Federal Practice Rules (Gann Law Books 2010), a commentary and annotations to the United States District Court's Local Rules, now in its 20th annual edition, and cited frequently by judges of the District of New Jersey and the Third Circuit. Among his other publications is his co-authorship, with Bruce D. Greenberg, of the chapter entitled "Class Action Litigation" in New Jersey Federal Civil Procedure (New Jersey Law Journal Books 1st ed. 1999, 2nd ed. 2008, and annual supplements), and author of Another Attempt to Heal the Wounds of the Holocaust, 27 Human Rights No. 2, (American Bar Association Spring 2000), and The Preaccusation Delay Dilemma, 10 Seton Hall Review 538 (1980). Mr. Lite was also quoted in A Border Battle Over Lawsuits (NLJ 2010).
Mr. Lite has 25 years of class action litigation experience. He has served in an active role as Lead, Co-Lead, or Liaison Counsel, court-appointed Claims Administrator, or as an expert witness on attorneys fees in over 100 cases, including major securities, derivative, antitrust, consumer fraud, employment discrimination, and products liability matters, in New Jersey federal and state courts and in other jurisdictions. Those cases, which have recovered billions of dollars for class members, range from suits to recover compensation for survivors of the Holocaust who had endured forced labor at the hands of German companies during the Nazi era, to seeking relief for policyholders of major insurance companies for improper sales practices in the sale of life insurance, to representing the State of New Jersey's Division of Investment in securities fraud suits to recover losses on investments from companies engaged in corporate wrongdoing. In four of those securities cases, Mr. Lite and LDG were Co-Lead Counsel for the State of New Jersey, Division of Investment, as Court-appointed Lead Plaintiff: Reginald Newton v. Tenet Healthcare Corp., (Tenet Healthcare Securities Litigation), cv-02-8462-RSWL (C.D. Cal.) ($281.5 million settlement); In re Motorola Securities Litigation; Civ. No. 03-C-287 (N.D. Ill.), reported opinions, 505 F. Supp. 2d 501 (N.D. Ill. 2007), 2004 WL 2032769 (N.D. Ill. Sept. 9, 2004) ($193 million settlement reached three business days before trial); State of New Jersey and its Division of Investment v. Sprint Corporation, Civil No. 03-2071-JWL (D. Kan.), reported opinions, 2008 WL 191780 (D. Kan. Jan. 23, 2008), 2004 WL 1960130 (D. Kan. Sept. 3, 2004), 314 F. Supp. 2d 1119 (D. Kan. 2004); In re STEC Inc. Securities Litigation, cv-09-1304(JVS)(C.D. Cal.)(ongoing). Mr. Lite recently authored an amicus brief to the United States Supreme Court in Morrison v. National Australian Bank during the 2009-2010 Court Term on the subject of the application of the securities laws of the United States to foreign investors, which brief was quoted in the National Law Journal.
Other significant class action cases in which Mr. Lite has played an active role include In re Bristol-Myers Squibb Securities Litigation, Civil Action No. 00-1190(SRC), District of New Jersey, reported opinions, 2005 WL 2007004 (D.N.J. Aug. 17, 2005), 205 F.R.D. 437 (D.N.J. 2002)(Liaison Counsel) ($185 million settlement plus significant corporate governance reforms after defeating defendants' summary judgment motion and motions to exclude expert testimony); In re Nazi Era Cases Against German Defendants Litigation, Civil Action No. 98-4104(WGB), District of New Jersey, 198 F.R.D. 429 (D.N.J. 2000) (Liaison Counsel in 60 actions filed throughout the United States and consolidated in the District of New Jersey; $5.2 billion settlement); In re Prudential Insurance Company of America Sales Practices Litigation, Master File No. 95-4704 (AMW), District of New Jersey, 962 F. Supp. 450 (D.N.J. 1997), affd as to settlement approval, 148 F.3d 283 (3d Cir. 1998) (Liaison Counsel) (settlement worth over $4 billion); Chin v. Chrysler Corporation, Civil Action No. 95-5569 (JCL), District of New Jersey, 461 F. Supp.2d 279 (D.N.J. 2006) (Co-Lead Counsel) (catalyst for $53 million in relief to class); Weiss v. Mercedes-Benz of North America, Master File No. 93-96 (JWB), District of New Jersey, 899 F. Supp. 1297 (D.N.J.), aff'd, 66 F.3d 314 (3d Cir. 1995) (Co-Counsel) ($75 million settlement); Princeton Economics Group, Inc. v. American Telephone and Telegraph Co., Docket No. L-3221-91, Superior Court of New Jersey, Law Division (Mercer County) (Lead Counsel) ($95 million settlement); Garcia v. General Motors, Docket No. L-4394-95, Superior Court of New Jersey, Law Division, Bergen County (Liaison Counsel) ($25 million settlement). These and many of Mr. Lite's other cases have resulted in reported opinions.
In other areas of his practice in complex litigation, Mr. Lite has worked for more than 20 years alongside some of the nation's top intellectual property firms, serving as New Jersey counsel in major patent and trademark litigation, particularly in the pharmaceutical industry, where Mr. Lite and LDG represent, among others, the world's largest manufacturer of generic drugs. This complex federal litigation practice has required both the successful pursuit and defense of preliminary and permanent injunctions.
Mr. Lite served on the Lawyers' Advisory Committee for the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit from 1992 through 1994, and as a member of the Third Circuit Task Force on Equal Treatment in the Courts, Gender Commission. He also chaired the United States District Court's Merit Selection Panel to recommend candidates for a newly authorized United States Magistrate Judge position assigned to Newark, New Jersey. In addition to many years of service on the Board of Trustees of the Association of the Federal Bar of New Jersey, Mr. Lite was co-chair for four years of the New Jersey State Bar Association's Class Action Committee and served as Chair of the District VA Ethics Committee. Mr. Lite is a member of numerous bar and court committees and is a frequent writer and lecturer on legal subjects.
Mr. Lite was selected as a mediator for the United States District Court pursuant to that Court's plan under the Civil Justice Improvements Act of 1990. As a mediator, Mr. Lite participated in environmental litigation involving the nation's largest Superfund site, and a multi-plaintiff public sector discrimination lawsuit, among others.
Mr. Lite is a 1978 cum laude graduate of the Seton Hall University School of Law. He served as Law Clerk to the Hon. H. Curtis Meanor, U.S. District Court Judge, District of New Jersey, 1978-1979, and as Executive Assistant to Hon. Clarkson S. Fisher, Chief Judge, District of New Jersey, 1981-1982. He also served as Adjunct Professor at Seton Hall Law School, 1980-1984, and at New York Law School, 1984-1986 as well as Lecturer at the Federal Judicial Center, 1982-1985.
Mr. Lite, who is a working artist, both exhibited and served as Chair of the Visual Arts Committee for the biennial Lawyers Celebration of the Arts at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center in 2003, 2005, 2007 and 2009. Mr. Lite was named to the "New Jersey Super Lawyers" list by New Jersey Monthly magazine in 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, and 2012. He also holds an "AV" rating from Martindale-Hubbell.