Brown Rudnick’s litigation co-chairs, Michael Bowe and Lauren Tabaksblat, have left the firm to launch a new boutique in New York focused on impact litigation.
Known as Brithem, the firm has launched with a team of 13, including nine lawyers, two investigators and two support staff. The firm will focus on courtroom advocacy in “matters of outsized commercial and societal consequence”, according to a statement.
“Big Law is drunk on leverage and billables that deliver little bang for the buck,” said Bowe, who was part of US president Donald Trump’s legal team during special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation. “Smart consumers of legal services know better, want an alternative and love supporting a firm that is also committed to combating child abuse, human trafficking, discrimination and other injustices.
“The AI revolution will only augment our proven ability to take on big fights leanly. Today, big is not better. It’s just unnecessarily more expensive.”
Bowe and Tabaksblat joined Brown Rudnick together in 2020 from national firm Kasowitz Benson Torres and bring decades of experience in commercial litigation to their new firm, particularly across real estate and securities litigation.
The duo acted for Fairfax Financial in a groundbreaking defence against a short-selling attack in a highly publicised civil Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) lawsuit credited with saving the company and restoring $2bn in investor value.
More recently, they brought cases against Aylo, the parent company of tubesite Pornhub, and financial services giant Visa on behalf of around 100 victims to stop the alleged monetisation of child pornography and rape videos on adult websites.
Currently, they are also pursuing a civil rights and RICO case against New Jersey officials, BlackRock and other Wall Street firms on behalf of Blueprint Capital Partners, the state’s largest Black-owned asset manager.
Joining Brithem for the launch are Valerie Ramos and Andrew Sutton, who have joined the firm as partners, having been of counsel and an associate at Quinn Emanuel. Former Supreme Court clerk Joseph Masterman will be of counsel, while Cravath alum Tyler Purinton, who has moved over from Brown Rudnick, will be a counsel.
There will also be a pair of senior associates and an associate, while retired NYPD captain James Holohan, who has worked with Bowe for 25 years, will head the team’s investigative group along with director of investigations Stephen Silver.
The firm expects more partners and associates to join in the next month and to have at least 20 lawyers in the first quarter of 2026.
A Brown Rudnick spokesperson commented: “Brown Rudnick has a vibrant litigation team in the US and London, with an eight-decade history of excellence in bet-the-company cases and a growing footprint. Our commitment to providing top-notch service to our clients is entirely unaffected by the departure of these two partners.”
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