Robert Elkin

Robert Elkin is a Principal in McKool Smith’s Dallas office. His practice focuses on complex commercial litigation and strategic litigation planning in areas such as: antitrust, securities, consumer class actions, mergers and acquisitions, fraudulent transfers, and complex contract disputes.  Mr. Elkin has obtained awards, court rulings, settlements, and business solutions worth billions of dollars. His clients include both plaintiffs and defendants from a broad range of industries, including information technology and telecommunications, energy, hedge funds, and financial institutions.

Mr. Elkin advises clients in high stakes, high profile disputes, and seeks to align litigation strategy with the clients’ business objectives.  He appears regularly in state and federal courts around the country, and in arbitration proceedings.  Most recently, he led a team in successfully defending Lennox, one of the world’s leading providers of climate control solutions, in a national class action in which the plaintiffs sought more than $1 billion in damages and injunctive relief. McKool Smith was named Lennox’s “Law Firm of the Year” for 2010 based on outstanding service and achievement in litigation.

Mr. Elkin is an author of Indirect Purchaser Standing in Antitrust Actions: Duplicative Liability in the Energy Industry, 11 ENERGY LAW JOURNAL 185 (1990).

Representative Matters

• Lennox International.  Mr. Elkin represents several affiliates of Lennox International in two consumer class actions in California federal and state court challenging the safety of Lennox’s glass fireplaces and seeking nearly $1 billion in damages.  The cases settled on terms providing that Lennox will make no financial payment to the class.  Mr. Elkin also represents Lennox in a wide range of other commercial litigation matters.
• Madoff-Related Litigation.  Mr. Elkin represents Bank Julius Baer & Co., a prominent Swiss private bank, in four related “clawback” cases in New York brought by the liquidators of hedge funds run by Fairfield Greenwich arising out of the Madoff Ponzi scheme, as well as related litigation in the British Virgin Islands.  He also represents a European hedge fund in connection with possible Madoff “clawback” litigation.
• Becton Dickinson, and Company.  Mr. Elkin represents Becton, Dickinson and Company, one of the world’s leading manufacturers of medical supplies, in an antitrust case brought by one of its competitors.  The case alleges monopolization of the market for safety syringes and IV catheters, which are products designed to prevent accidental needle sticks that can injure healthcare workers.
• Corporate Fiduciary and Mergers and Acquisitions Litigation.  Mr. Elkin has handled many corporate fiduciary and mergers and acquisition cases, most recently successfully representing Electronic Data Systems Corporation (“EDS”) in multiple corporate governance derivative suits and state and federal class actions attacking EDS’s merger with Hewlett-Packard Company, and representing the former executive chairman and largest stockholder of Affiliated Computer Services (“ACS”) in state and federal class actions in Delaware and Texas challenging the merger of ACS with Xerox.
• Electronic Data Systems Corporation/Hewlett-Packard . For 20 years, Mr. Elkin has represented EDS, before and after its acquisition by Hewlett-Packard, in major contract and intellectual property disputes, such as EDS v. Computer Associates, and EDS v. Xerox.  In EDS v. WorldCom/MCI, over a span of 5 years, Mr. Elkin spearheaded a team that prosecuted several multibillion dollar arbitrations to favorable conclusions.  All told, Mr. Elkin’s representations earned or saved EDS over several billion dollars. 
• Parkland Hospital.  When Parkland Hospital’s computerized patient record and billing systems crashed, it hired Mr. Elkin to not only investigate and prosecute claims against Parkland’s IT services vendor, but also obtain a business resolution that successfully terminated Parkland’s contract with the vendor. 
• Santa Monica Amusements.  Mr. Elkin represented the company that owns and operates the Santa Monica amusement park on the Santa Monica Pier when it was sued by Dallas venture capitalists over a failed transaction to buy the park.  He successfully prosecuted a motion to dismiss the case.
• Gulf South Pipeline Company, LLP. In Wyble v. Gulf South Pipeline, Mr. Elkin represented an interstate natural gas pipeline against a class of landowners seeking to have a court-appointed master take control of the pipeline system due to alleged violations of the Pipeline Safety Act. After the Eastern District of Texas entered a landmark ruling denying the plaintiffs standing to bring most of their claims, the case settled on favorable terms for the pipeline company.
• Non-Profit Antitrust and Fiduciary Litigation.  Representing the court-appointed guardian of a wealthy mentally incapacitated woman who had been victimized by nonprofit organizations that had assumed control of her wealth and marketed financial products to her, Mr. Elkin obtained a landmark Fifth Circuit ruling that nonprofit organizations could be sued for price fixing under the antitrust laws and, in a related lawsuit for breach of fiduciary duty, obtained a settlement giving the woman financial independence.

Awards & Recognition

• Listed in the guide to the Best Lawyers in America
  
• Named by his peers to the Texas Super Lawyers list

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