Cuneo Gilbert & LaDuca LLP

In The News

Lead Class Counsel Charles LaDuca of Cuneo Gilbert & LaDuca, LLP is proud to announce that on November 17, 2011, Judge Royal Furgeson, Senior Judge in the Northern District of Texas, granted final approval to a $125 million all cash settlement concerning defective Kitec Plumbing Systems.

Robert J. Cynkar and counsel successfully defend defense contractor IIF Data Solutions in case regarding whistleblower charges that it defrauded the United States of America.

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Spotlight Cases

Thanks to our talented and dedicated lawyers, CGL has a record of success in a variety of legal fields. From the famous Enron case to seeking economic retribution for Holocaust survivors; from multi-billion dollar antitrust suits to nationwide class actions, our accomplishments reflect years of experience and expertise as advocates in courtrooms and in Congress.

Cuneo Gilbert and LaDuca, LLP ("CGL"), has a long history of successful advocacy in cases of national significance. These cases represent our some of our best work both as lawyers and as advocates for others.

Joe Camel

Our firm was among the first group of three firms to challenge tobacco industry advertising practices. In 1991, with two California firms, we brought the so-called "Joe Camel" case, which alleged essentially that R. J. Reynolds Tobacco Company's Joe Camel Advertising Campaign illegally tricked children into smoking cigarettes.

We subsequently became involved with representing fourteen California counties in claims for reimbursement of healthcare related expenses. The settlement of the Joe Camel case provided for the public disclosure of evidence that, in fact, R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company had studied under-aged smokers with a view toward selling cigarettes. We and our team turned these documents over to Congressman Henry Waxman, who released them, calling our team "real American heroes." These were perhaps the most significant documents concerning tobacco industry practices ever released and led to the phase out of the Joe Camel campaign.

Enron

CGL, served as Washington counsel for the plaintiffs' team in the Enron Securities Litigation. That litigation recovered over $7 billion on behalf of defrauded investors.

Much of the focus of the litigation was in Congress and in the Supreme Court. CGL attorneys assisted the lead counsel in the development of the theory of "scheme liability" in 2002. We also marshaled numerous amici to file briefs in the Supreme Court in support of that theory. The recovery in that case was the largest in the history of federal securities litigation.

Entran II

In one of the largest product defect recoveries in recent history, Jonathan Cuneo and Charles LaDuca served as lead council in a bi-national settlement that provided $340 million for the defective radiant heating hose known as Entran II.

CertainTeed Defective Roofing Shingles

In recent months CGL and lead attorney Charles LaDuca has secured one of our largest product defect settlements (valued by Class Counsel at over $700 Million dollars) over CertainTeed's defective organic shingles. The settlement covers more than 1.8 million homes across North America.

The suit alleges that CertainTeed's organic shingles fail to perform as marketed and that CertainTeed knowingly and intentionally concealed these defects. The suits also allege that CertainTeed had no intention of providing the services set forth in their warranties for these roofing shingles. The Settlement was Preliminarily Approved on December 29, 2009. The Court is scheduled to hold a final approval hearing on June 8, 2010.

Information about the settlement is available on the web at www.certainteedshinglesettlement.com

Gold Train

Our firm acted as co-lead counsel in a case on behalf of survivors of the Holocaust in Hungary, and their heirs whose fortunes were appropriated by the U.S. government in the final days of World War II.

After four years of hard fought litigation, our firm won $25.5 million to be distributed worldwide to survivors through an existing social welfare program for survivors of the Holocaust in Hungary, as well as an unprecedented apology from the Bush Administration for the conduct of the U.S. Army.

Metromail

The Metromail case commenced when Ohio grandmother Beverly Dennis contacted us because she had received a sexually suggestive letter from a maximum-security inmate in the state of Texas. As it turned out Ms. Dennis had innocently filled out and returned a questionnaire in a supermarket.

The company who had collected the information had in turn subcontracted with Texas state prisoners to "key" the information. Our firm brought a path-breaking class action, a one of a kind privacy case in Texas state court. That case was settled in 2000 for significant injunctive relief, as well as creating an available pool of cash of $15 million for victims.

Strip Search Cases

Charles LaDuca and Alexandra Warren have served as co-lead counsel in approximately twenty major cases that challenged the strip search policies of counties and municipalities across the country, which include Buffalo, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, San Antonio, as well as several counties in New Jersey.

All in all, our litigation has won injunctive relief preventing future violations of the Constitution in 12 counties and achieved over $29 million in settlement funds.

Prudential

In this triumph class action, CGL individually represented claimants against Prudential insurance Company. Prudential had abused policyholders through deceptive sales practices.

Over a period of eighteen months, our firm led a small army of lawyers who in turn conducted approximately 55,000 arbitration like proceeding in this $4 billion settlement.

IIF Data Solutions

IFF Data Solutions hired Robert Cynkar at the last minute to defend it against bogus charges of defrauding the government of over $100 million in this "bet your company" case. In November 2009, after a three-week trial, Cynkar and his new legal team won a defense verdict.