Robert M. Manley

Robert Manley is a trial lawyer who represents clients in complex commercial, insurance recovery, investment, fiduciary duty, and intellectual property matters. Robert is recognized by his peers and the legal media as a pre-eminent trial lawyer and routinely tries complex matters successfully to juries across the country. Robert’s representations have included Halliburton, TIAA, CenturyLink, Ericsson, Zachry, Nationstar d/b/a Mr. Cooper, ORIX, Fidelity Investments, BearingPoint, Pilgrim's Pride, Maxus Energy, American Airlines, Freescale, MediaTek, Cisco Systems, InFocus, Applied Biosystems, Safeway, Igloo, and many others.

Most recently, Robert represented Halliburton in securing a take-nothing defense verdict following a two-week trade secret and patent infringement jury trial in Houston, Texas. He also secured a substantial verdict for Canyon Ridge Resorts against an investment bank in a fraud and breach of fiduciary duty dispute following a seven-week jury trial. The verdict was recognized as a VerdictSearch “Top 100 Verdict” and helped secure McKool Smith’s inclusion in Law360’s listing of the “Most Feared Plaintiff Firms.” A month later, Robert defended CenturyLink and several of its Officers in a three-week securities fraud jury trial in Houston, Texas, which resulted in a total defense verdict for his clients.

Robert also represents corporate policyholders in complex insurance coverage disputes. He recently represented TIAA-CREF in securing a substantial jury verdict which found that TIAA-CREF did not need permission from excess-coverage provider Arch Insurance Co. prior to settling multiple class action lawsuits. The jury also awarded TIAA-CREF attorney fees after finding that the nearly $10 million in legal defense costs incurred by the entity were reasonable. The Final Judgment against three insurers, along with a confidential settlement with a fourth insurer, reflect recoveries for TIAA-CREFF in excess of $50 million. The verdict was upheld by the Delaware Supreme Court.  

Robert is equally known for his creative approach to resolving clients’ cases outside the courtroom. Robert has pioneered unconventional dispute resolution (“UDR”)—see experience. He has used these unconventional approaches to dispute resolution successfully to resolve numerous high-stakes disputes for his clients outside the Courtroom. His proven ability to resolve cases efficiently inside and outside the courtroom is why clients call on him again and again.

Robert has also dedicated a substantial part of his professional career to “paying-it-forward” by teaching, lecturing and mentoring on the “Lost Art of the Jury Trial.” Since 1998, Robert has taught younger generations of trial lawyers the art of trial by serving as an Instructor, Team Leader, and now as a Program Director of the National Institute of Trial Advocacy’s Dallas Trial Program. Robert has taught courses on trial law and trial advocacy at Southern Methodist University’s Dedman School of Law. He also mentors young lawyers as a Master in the Higginbotham Inn of Court.

Trade Secrets matters:

• Legacy Separators and Guy Morrison, III v. Halliburton Energy Services, Inc., et al. Won a take nothing verdict in favor of Halliburton in a three-week jury trial in Houston Federal Court in a theft of trade secret, fraud, and patent infringement case.  The jury hung on two patent infringement issues−also in favor of Halliburton.    
• Advanced Technology Group (“ATG”) v. Sperlonga Data & Analytics & DigitForge Enterprises, LLC. Represented ATG against Sperlonga and DigitForge in a theft of trade secrets matter in Dallas Federal Court successfully securing a Federal Court Order providing for software accounting, permanent, individual, and corporate injunctions, and 15 years of audit rights for ATG. 
• Collateral Analytics, LLC v. Nationstar Mortgage LLC, Xome Settlement Services LLC, and Quantarium, LLC. Represented Nationstar, Xome and Quantarium against theft of trade secret allegations dealing with automated valuation model (AVM) software, successfully securing a settlement in favor of his clients.

• Monosite, Inc. v. Northern Telecom, et al.  Represented Monosite, a start-up in the telecommunications cell-tower manufacturing industry, in a trade secrets and tortious interference lawsuit against Northern Telecom. The cased focused on certain non-disclosure agreements signed by the companies covering certain proprietary monopole designs and manufacturing processes for the installation of cellular towers.

Commercial/mortgage-backed securities/investment matters:

• TIAA-CREF v. Illinois National Insurance Company, et al. Won a substantial verdict in a Wilmington, Delaware, jury trial against several insurers that denied coverage for TIAA-CREF following class actions resulting from TIAA-CREF’s software implementation effort.  The verdict was returned in December 2016 and affirmed by the Delaware Supreme Court on July 30, 2018. 
• Schermerhorn et al. v. CenturyLink et al. Won a take-nothing defense verdict and judgment for CenturyLink and several individual executives in a securities fraud mass-action lawsuit involving 64 plaintiffs that brought claims relating to investment in and the subsequent sale of control of a distressed company.
• Scenic Land Company LLC, et al. v. Sterne Agee & Leach Inc., et al. Won a substantial verdict in a seven-week jury trial for a hotel development client in a case against an investment bank for fraud, breach of fiduciary duty, and breach of contract. The verdict and judgment were reported as the largest in Hamilton County (Chattanooga, Tennessee) history and helped McKool Smith to be recognized again in Law360’s “Most Feared Plaintiffs Firm” feature.
• La Salle Bank, et al. v. UBS Warburg and UBS PaineWebber. Represented the interests of a group of certificate holders in a $704 million pool of mortgage-backed securities as part of a series of lawsuits against the securitization’s sponsors and loan depositors to recover the plaintiffs’ lost investment value.

Click here to view additional commercial/investment representations.

Bankruptcy matters:

• BearingPoint.  John DeGroote Services LLC as Liquidating Trustee to the BearingPoint Liquidating Trust v. Ed Harbach, et al. Represented the liquidating trustee for BearingPoint Inc. in numerous adversary proceedings involving preferences, fraudulent transfers, and other matters, assisting the trustee in recovering over $476 million for distribution to BearingPoint Inc.’s creditors. As part of this effort, Robert represented the trustee in a breach of fiduciary duty/corporate governance lawsuit against BearingPoint’s former chief executive officer and its board of directors.
• Buccaneer. Represented the Liquidating Trustee of Buccaneer Resources and eight related entities in a lawsuit against former directors and officers for breach of fiduciary duties, in a suit involving the failed purchase, refurbishment, and deployment of a $100M offshore drilling rig to the North Sea. 
• Zachry. Representing Zachry Construction Corporation, Zachry American Infrastructure, and Zachry Industrial Inc. in defense of related fiduciary duty and fraudulent transfer claims arising out of the construction of a billion-dollar public-private partnership toll road.
• Lake Las Vegas. Lake Las Vegas Creditors Trust. (D. Nev) represented Creditors Trust in action for recovery of $470 million fraudulent transfer arising from transfers from Real Estate Resort Southwest in Las Vegas Bankruptcy Court.
• In re: AgriBioTech, Inc. – Represented BearingPoint in an adversary proceeding brought by AgriBioTech’s Bankruptcy Trustee against its officers, directors, auditors, and consultants involving claims that BearingPoint’s four-year, nationwide implementation of computer systems caused or contributed to AgriBioTech’s insolvency.

Unconventional dispute resolution case studies:

• "Hire a judge ... and a jury." Represented investors’ interests in a complex investment case against a group of financial institutions. The biggest challenge was the anticipated four- to five-year wait before the court would actually hear the trial. Through imaginative negotiations, the parties agreed by contract to retain a retired judge to hear all matters associated with the lawsuit and, using a borrowed courtroom and local citizens recruited to act as the jury, the parties then proceeded to litigate the matter in normal fashion, including submitting pretrial motions, conducting voir dire, and proceeding to “trial.” In the end, Robert’s clients made a significant recovery in a fraction of the time that otherwise would have been required to resolve the matter at trial.
• "Saving face." Represented a multinational corporation that was sued for allegedly causing the demise of one of its clients as a result of failures in the nationwide software integration. Robert favorably resolved the matter after requesting and making a diplomatic, unilateral presentation to the opposing party—who itself had fiduciary duties to stakeholders—regarding its failure to maintain the alleged failed software system. The matter was resolved at the opposing party’s request shortly thereafter without any public allegations of spoliation. 
• “Tell it to the judge.” Represented a Fortune 500 company in a contentious intellectual property dispute that was expected to last for years. Ultimately, the potential damages became the focal point of the case, and Robert convinced the opposing party to conduct a joint “summary trial” in the court’s chambers, which resulted in a favorable settlement for his client.
• “Now that I’m here, where am I?” Robert’s teams routinely prepare early case assessments (ECA) for their clients—thereby the clients know very early in the litigation process the merits of positions, the likely course litigation will take, and are provided an early opportunity to explore a business resolution to the dispute. This practice of preparing ECAs has led to several successful settlements for Robert’s clients without extensive litigation or trial.
• “We can do this the easy way, or …” When initiating a lawsuit, Robert often drafts and serves the defendant with a lengthy complaint, annotated to, and quoting from, case documents while publicly filing a “bare bones” complaint with the court. This allows the parties to evaluate some of the substance of the pending lawsuit without unnecessarily making public allegations, frequently leading to an early resolution.

• The “Frienemies” Multistate Series of Arbitrations – Robert tried a series of nationwide arbitrations for a startup company in the cellular recycling ecosystem against an industry giant involving theft of trade secrets, unfair competition, breach of joint-venture agreements, and improper accounting issues. The parties initially entered multiple joint-ventures, but later found working together impossible before engaging in a multi-front series of litigations and arbitrations.

For a further outline of some techniques Robert uses to resolve cases outside the courtroom, see his UDR Presentation here.

Intellectual property matters:

• Freescale Semiconductor, Inc. v. LSI Corporation. Represented Freescale in an investigation before the International Trade Commission involving U.S. Patent Nos. 5,775,798; 6,473,349 B1; and 5,467,455 generally directed to the packaging and manufacture of semiconductor chips.
• Mediatek, Inc. v. Sanyo Elec. Co., Ltd., et al. and Mediatek v. Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. Represented Mediatek in patent infringement lawsuits involving U.S. Patent Nos. 5,867,819 and 6,118,486, which are generally directed to audio decoding and the synchronization and processing of multiple formatted video signals.
• Maxim Integrated Products v. Freescale Semiconductor, Inc. Represented Freescale in a patent infringement case involving U.S. Patent Nos. 5,008,615; 5,172,214; 5,200,362; 5,476,816; 5,593,538; 5,776,798; 5,861,347; 4,951,005; 5,081,454; 5,089,722; 5,195,655; 5,434,739; 5,124,632; and 5,946,177. The patents are generally directed to the design, packaging and manufacture of semiconductor chips.
• ConnecTel v. Cisco Systems. Represented Cisco in a patent infringement suit involving U.S. Patent Nos. 6,016,307; 6,144,641; 6,456,594; and 6,473,404, which are generally directed to multiprotocol telecommunications routing and optimization.
• Brilliant Technologies v. InFocus Corp. Represented InFocus in an intellectual property licensing dispute covering a projection system with a folded optical path involving U.S. Patent No. 6,859,239.
• Raindance Communications, Inc. v. WebEx. Represented Raindance in a patent infringement lawsuit involving U.S. Patent Nos. 6,535,909 and 6,621,834, which are generally directed to voice transmission over network protocols and the recording and playback of collaborative web browsing sessions.

 Click here to view additional intellectual property representations.

• Recognized in the guide to the Lawdragon 500 Leading Litigators in America, 2022-2023
• Ranked in Chambers USA as a leading general commercial litigation lawyer. The 2023 edition notes that "He is an outstanding lawyer. He is methodical, detail-oriented and confident in the courtroom."
• Robert is a fellow in the Litigation Counsel of America (LCA), which is a trial lawyer honorary society composed of less than one-half of one percent of U.S. lawyers. Fellowship in the LCA is highly-selective and by invitation only. Fellows are selected based upon effectiveness and accomplishment in litigation, both at the trial and appellate levels, and superior ethical reputation.
• Robert’s recent jury verdict in the Scenic Land case helped McKool Smith to be recognized again as Law360’s "Most Feared Plaintiffs Firm"
• Repeatedly recognized in Best Lawyers in America for Insurance, Securities and Intellectual Property Litigation 
• Repeatedly recognized as a Texas Super Lawyers by Thomson Reuters’ legal division in Texas Monthly magazine
• Recognized as a leading lawyer in Patent Litigation by The Legal 500, 2021
• Repeatedly recognized as a Best Lawyers in Dallas by D Magazine
• Recognized among Lawdragon's 500 Leading Plaintiff Financial Lawyers
• Recognized as a Lawdragon Leading Plaintiff Lawyer
• Received the Client Choice Award for Litigation by Texas International Law Office and Lexology
• Repeatedly recognized as one of the Best Lawyers Under 40 [… back when he was, in fact, under 40] by D Magazine
• Master, Higginbotham American Inn of Court

• Member, College of the State Bar of Texas

• National Institute of Trial Advocacy, Gulf Coast Regional Program

• Faculty, National Institute of Trial Advocacy, Southern Regional Trial Skills Program, 1998-present

• Adjunct professor of trial advocacy at Southern Methodist University Dedman School of Law, 2001-present

• Co-chair, Dallas Heart Ball with Dana Manley

• Co-chair, General Counsel Forum 12th Annual Conference