Litigation

McAfee & Taft has a Litigation Group rich with talent and experience. The group features senior trial lawyers who have handled complex litigation across the nation and who have garnered much recognition from their peers.  The firm has the most lawyers of any Oklahoma firm selected by The Best Lawyers in America in the field of business litigation and is the only Oklahoma firm to be top-ranked in the most recent edition of  the Chambers USA Guide to America’s Leading Lawyers for Business.

Our Litigation Group is proud of the depth of its talent and the high degree of cooperation enjoyed among all lawyers and legal assistants who are assigned to meet our clients’ litigation needs. The latest in modern technological support complements this cooperation and talent in a way that allows the firm to effectively represent clients in disputes on a regional and national level.

Notable Litigation

• Obtained jury verdict and judgment of nearly $6 million on behalf of a national manufacturer of oil and gas equipment in an action against a former executive and former distributor involving allegations of misappropriation of trade secrets, fraud, unfair competition, breach of contract, tortious interference, conversion, deceptive trade practices, and breach of fiduciary duties.
• Obtained jury verdict of patent infringement and an award of $9.5 million in federal court in favor of the inventor of a guiding heart catheter against Medtronic, the world’s largest medical technology company.
• In a case defending a major automobile manufacturer where a product defect was alleged to be responsible for a catastrophic brain injury of an 8-year-old, we successfully excluded plaintiff’s expert under Daubert resulting in a summary judgment for our client. Judgment affirmed on appeal to the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals.
• Obtained a plaintiff’s verdict in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Oklahoma for technology client for misappropriation of trade secrets and unfair competition, including findings of willfulness and punitive damages. Prior to trial, the court also granted summary judgment in client’s favor on certain Lanham Act claims. Post-trial, the court entered an order awarding additional damages.
• Obtained a jury verdict in Oklahoma County, Oklahoma, in favor of a manufacturer of sports and fitness equipment in a product liability case involving allegations of negligent design and failure to warn resulting in a crushed hand.
• Obtained summary judgment in federal court on behalf of KIA Motors Corporation in a case involving allegations of manufacturer’s products liability and negligence resulting from a severe high-speed, frontal offset collision between a KIA Sephia and a semi-tractor trailer.
• On post-trial motions, obtained judgment as a matter of law and reversal of adverse jury verdict of $700,000 against a major insurance carrier involving a dispute over uninsured motorist coverage. Decision affirmed on appeal by the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals.
• Obtained a jury verdict in Tulsa County, Oklahoma, in favor of a leading electronics manufacturer in a lawsuit involving allegations of defective design and manufacture of a microwave’s control panel, allegedly resulting in a house fire.
• Obtained a unanimous defense verdict in Oklahoma County, Oklahoma, in favor of Ford Motor Company in a lawsuit involving allegations of a defective truck transmission design resulting in a serious injury.
• Obtained a defense verdict in favor of a loss prevention investigator employed by a fashion retailer in a case involving allegations of wrongful termination, kidnapping, false imprisonment, coercion into the signing of documents under false pretenses, and falsely procuring a person’s signature.
• Obtained a trial victory for Big Lots Stores, Inc. in its appeal of an ad valorem tax valuation of the company’s Oklahoma warehouse. The court ultimately sided with the average valuation figures presented by Big Lots’ experts, which was 61 percent less than the county’s assessment.
• Served as coordinating counsel and lead negotiator for a 44-member group of potentially responsible parties in a CERCLA (SuperFund) action in Oklahoma City, including an appeal before the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals.
• Obtained summary judgment for CNH American, a leading manufacturer of agricultural tractors, in a product liability and personal injury action in which the plaintiff alleged he suffered serious injuries when the tractor he was driving ran over him while he was starting it.
• Prior to a global settlement being reached, defended a leading pharmaceutical company in hundreds of cases against claims that one of its prescription drugs caused heart valve problems.
• Handled more than 350 product liability cases, including several purported class actions, while serving as sole Oklahoma counsel for a major pharmaceutical corporation whose nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug was alleged to cause cardiac events. The firm was successful in getting all the cases removed, when filed in state court, and transferred to the U.S. District Court of the Eastern District of Louisiana pursuant to orders from the Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation.
• Successfully represented a grinding product manufacturer in defense of a claim of patent infringement resulting in a jury verdict of invalidity, a finding of inequitable conduct, and a finding for the client on its claim of tortious interference of business relationships in an amount in excess of $2.1 million.
• Representation of an inventor in patent infringement litigation involving a heart catheter resulting in a jury verdict for client in excess of $14 million. Judgment affirmed on appeal to the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals.

For more details regarding our areas of litigation expertise, please select from the practice area links on the right.