HarrisMartin's Water Contamination Litigation Conference Speaker Profiles

A trial lawyer with more than 30 years of experience litigating complex mass torts, Esther Berezofsky has devoted her career to representing communities impacted by environmental contamination and fighting for the rights of consumers, individuals and families impacted by fraud and misconduct across a range of litigation areas.
CLOSE

Esther focuses her practice on protecting the rights and seeking accountability for people harmed by toxic chemical exposure—environmental and occupational—as well as patients who suffer life-altering complications caused by dangerous and defective medical drugs and devices.

Prior to becoming an attorney, Esther practiced as a clinical psychologist and consultant for a national network of law firms on post-traumatic stress and community trauma arising out of environmental disasters such as Three Mile Island, Pa., and Times Beach, Mo. She currently serves on the Executive Committee as class counsel for residents exposed to lead contaminated water in the Flint water crisis litigation, in addition to litigating similar cases in Fresno, Calif. She also represents residents in Kent County, Mich., Hoosick Falls, N.Y. and Petersburgh, N.Y. in litigation against corporations such as 3M, Wolverine, St. Gobain and others accused of manufacturing and wrongfully disposing of PFAS chemicals. She was lead counsel for a cancer cluster of children in Toms River, N.J, the story of which is memorialized in the Pulitzer prize winning book: Toms River: A Story of Science and Salvation.

For more than 25 years, Gale Pearson has represented thousands of plaintiffs in a range of complex litigation, from environmental law to pharmaceutical litigation to Qui Tam prosecution. Before receiving her Juris Doctor from Loyola Law School, Gale attended California State University, where she studied laboratory medicine, physics, and chemistry. She spent years working in the Los Angeles County/USC Medical Center and is a nationally recognized clinical laboratory scientist. As such, Gale plays a substantial role in Fears Nachawati’s representation of those who have been harmed by environmental polluters, as well as the bad acts of the pharmaceutical and medical device industries. Throughout her career, Gale has played a pivotal role in several MDL litigations, serving on science committees, or, as in the case of a Certified Class Action against Phillip Morris, Co. and its parent company, as lead counsel. In United States Absher v. Momence Meadows Nursing Center Inc., she served as co-lead counsel and helped achieve a substantial verdict for her clients. In addition, she was asked to serve as Plaintiff’s liaison counsel in the Minnesota State Medtronic Cases, and was appointed to the same position in the Minnesota State Guidant Cases. A member of the Million Dollar Advocates Forum, Gale’s legal success has earned her peer recognition across the country. In 2003, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer presented her the Outstanding Pro Bono Service Award for her work with the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund. In 2005, she was recognized by Forbes Magazine among America’s top attorneys, and she has been named to the Minnesota Super Lawyers list by Thomson Reuters from 2015-2019. Gale is frequently invited to speak on scientific issues related pharmaceuticals, as well as complex interstate civil procedures.

Scott Summy is a shareholder at Baron & Budd, one of the largest and oldest firms in the United States that specializes in environmental litigation. Mr. Summy heads the firm’s Environmental Litigation Group, which litigates complex environmental contamination cases all over the country. A large part of the Group’s practice focuses on representing public entities in litigation to recover costs of removing chemical contamination from public water supplies, governmental facilities, natural resources, and public property. Through this type of litigation, the Group seeks to shift the costs of remediation to the chemical manufacturers and suppliers responsible for the contamination — and away from public entities and taxpayers. The Group also represents individuals and public entities in large complex cases including wildfires and oil spills. The Group has also taken on several cases representing school districts against e-cigarette manufacturers for the health crisis caused by youth vaping.

Roe Frazer is a lawyer with considerable first-chair experience in complex litigation. He is an early adopter of technology, leveraging it in his practice to achieve better, faster, and more predictable results. Roe is also a lawyer-entrepreneur, with seasoned experience in start-up businesses. Roe is the chair of Frazer PLC.
Roe is one of the top trial lawyers in the United States, trying many complex tort and product liability cases, primarily on the plaintiff’s side, as well as representing business and commercial litigants. Early in his career, Roe was selected as the Outstanding Trial Lawyer of the Year in Mississippi in 1993. He has been lead counsel in many multi-million dollar verdicts in complex and commercial litigation cases, and handled scores of civil settlements in the hundreds of millions of dollars. Roe also has a considerable amount of experience defending companies in a myriad of business disputes, contract claims, and tort litigation.

Roe is a 2018 Delegate to the 75th Judicial Conference Conference of the Sixth Circuit U.S. Courts. He is a frequent speaker and writer on a variety of legal and technology topics, earning the distinction of a “Global Top 100 Legal Technology Thought Leader” by City Tech Magazine, London U.K., plus being featured in the “President’s Corner” of Law & Technology News.

Roe is the Co-Founder of Cicayda, a litigation SaaS in e-discovery, as well as the former CEO of CaseLogistix, a critically acclaimed e-discovery review software, now owned by Thomson Reuters.

At Cumberland Law School (Class of 1985) he was the Editor-in-Chief of the Cumberland Law Review and Co-Captain of the National Moot Court team. He is a 1982 graduate of Wake Forest University.

Roe is active in the Nashville start-up business community and mentors and assists young entrepreneurs. He is a casual golfer, 9990 skier, and sports enthusiast, coaching AAU Boys Basketball for many years. Roe is proud to be a Kentucky Colonel, and you likely can find him at Churchill Downs on the first Saturday in May.