Joseph G. Sauder
JOSEPH G. SAUDER is a Partner in the Firm's Haverford office. Mr. Sauder concentrates his practice on prosecuting class action litigation, including securities fraud, shareholder derivative actions, consumer protection, ERISA and antitrust cases on behalf of shareholders, consumers and institutional clients. Prior to joining the firm, Mr. Sauder was an associate with a major Philadelphia firm where he concentrated on complex civil litigation. From 1998 to 2003, Mr. Sauder was a prosecutor in the Philadelphia District Attorney's Office where he served as lead counsel in hundreds of criminal trials including over twenty jury trials involving major felonies.
In 2006, 2007 and 2008 Law & Politics and the publishers of Philadelphia Magazine included Mr. Sauder as a Pennsylvania Rising Star, as listed in the "Pennsylvania Rising Stars Super Lawyers" publication. Only 2.5 percent of the total lawyers in Pennsylvania are listed in Rising Stars.
In August 2007, American Lawyer Media, publisher of The Legal Intelligencer and the Pennsylvania Law Weekly, named Mr. Sauder as one of the "Lawyers on the Fast Track" a distinction that recognized thirty-five Pennsylvania attorneys under the age of 40 who show outstanding promise in the legal profession and make a significant commitment to their community.
Mr. Sauder has handled or is currently prosecuting the following actions:
• In re Heartland Payment Systems Inc. Customer Data Security Breach Litig., No. H-09-MD-02046 (S.D.Tx.). Mr. Sauder is co-lead counsel on this case, which is the largest data breach in history. The lawsuit seeks to represent a putative class of banks, credit unions, and financial institutions that have re-issued debit and credit cards, incurred unreimbursed fraudulent charges, or were otherwise injured as a result of the data breach.
• Kurian v. County of Lancaster, No. 2:07-cv-03482-PD (E.D.Pa.) and Allison, et al. v. The GEO Group, No. 2:08-cv-467-JD (E.D.Pa.). Mr. Sauder is co-lead counsel on these civil rights lawsuits, filed on behalf of pre-trial detainees. The parties recently reached an agreement in principle to settle these cases.
• Cook v. Rockwell International and the Dow Chemical Company, No. 90-cv-00181 (D. Co.) Mr. Sauder assisted with the trial of this environmental case involving the Rocky Flats Nuclear Weapons Plant. The case sought property damages (compensatory and punitive) for a class of approximately 15,000 persons owning parcels downwind of Rocky Flats, which is located about 16 miles northwest of downtown Denver, Colorado. In February 2006 a jury returned a verdict of $554 million on behalf the class. It includes an award of $200 million in punitive damages.
• In re Insurance Brokerage Antitrust Litigation, No. 2:04-cv-05184-GEB-PS (D.N.J.), Mr. Sauder provided substantial assistance with this case involving allegations of bid rigging and steering against numerous insurance brokers and insurers. The district court has granted final approval to settlements valued at approximately $218 million.
• In re Textainer Financial Services Corporation, et al., No. CGC 05-440303 (Superior Court of California, County of San Francisco), Mr. Sauder was actively involved this case in which C&T was co-lead counsel. This class action alleged breach of fiduciary duty on behalf of limited partnership unit holders related to a sale of assets that allegedly provided the limited partnership holders with inadequate consideration, and where they received an allegedly misleading Proxy related to the sale. In early 2009, the court approved a $10 million settlement.
• International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 98 v. Janssen, L.P. et al, 3:07-cv-02608-JAP-JJH (D.N.J.) and In Re: Seroquel Products Liability Litigation, 6:06-md-01769-ACC-DAB (M.D. Fla.). Mr. Sauder is a member of the court-appointed Executive Committee of third-party payor (“TPP”) plaintiffs in these pending cases allege that the defendants engaged in a scheme to market and promote the drugs for “off-label uses,” (i.e., uses not approved by the FDA), thus denying the TPP plaintiffs the opportunity to pay for equally safe and effective, and much less expensive, alternatives.
Mr. Sauder received his Bachelor of Science, magna cum laude in Finance from Temple University in 1995. He graduated from Temple University School of Law in 1998, where he was a member of Temple Law Review.
Mr. Sauder’s public service activities include teaching trial advocacy to a local Philadelphia high school team which competed in the State Mock Trial Competition. He is vice president of the Philadelphia District Attorneys’ Alumni Association and on the Executive Committee of Temple Law Alumni Association. His pro bono activities include serving as a volunteer attorney with the Support Center for Child Advocates, a nonprofit organization that provides legal and social services to abused and neglected children.
Mr. Sauder is admitted to practice before the Supreme Courts of Pennsylvania and New Jersey, the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, the United States District Courts for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, the Middle District of Pennsylvania, the District of New Jersey and the District of Colorado.