Meet the 2009 Board of Governors

Biographies:

Arnold G. Blair III
Sr. Staff Attorney, WilmerHale
Mr. Blair is a senior staff attorney in the firm's Litigation/Controversy Department. He joined the firm in 2004. Mr. Blair focuses his practice on issues of e-discovery. Specifically, he works with other attorneys, litigation technology project managers, and paralegals on teams that manage electronic and other documents in large cases and investigations. Attorneys on these teams take a leadership role in the document control process, systematically tracking documents from preservation to collection and through review and production. They work with e-discovery vendors and their review and analytical tools; review documents; train and oversee other firm and contract attorneys who review documents; and partner with project managers to perform production quality control.

Mr. Blair holds his JD, cum laude, from New York Law School and BA from Rutgers University.

The Hon. Mark Cavanagh
Michigan Second District Court of Appeals
Mark J. Cavanagh is a judge on the Michigan Second District Court of Appeals. He was elected to the Court in 1988 and his current term expires January 1, 2015. Judge Cavanagh received his bachelor's degree from the University of Michigan and his law degree from the Detroit College of Law.  Prior to his election to the Court of Appeals, Judge Cavanagh worked as a special assistant attorney general, an assistant Wayne County prosecutor and as an attorney in private practice.

Linda A. Klein is Managing Shareholder in the Firm's Georgia offices and a member of the Firm's Board of Directors.  Her practice includes most types of business dispute resolution, including contract law, construction law, fidelity and surety law, employment law, and professional liability. In 1998, Georgia Trend Magazine named her one of the 100 most powerful and influential Georgians. Atlanta Magazine has named her a Georgia Super Lawyer and one of the Top 50 Women Lawyers in Georgia annually since 2004. In 2007, she was named by Georgia Trend Magazine as one of Georgia's Legal Elite. In 2004 the American Bar Association honored Ms. Klein with the prestigious Margaret Brent Achievement Award.  In 2009 Ms. Klein was honored with the Randolph Thrower Award for Lifetime Achievement and was named to the YWCA Academy of Women Achievers.  Ms. Klein is also listed in The Best Lawyers in America®, Who's Who in America and Chambers USA.

In June 1997, Ms. Klein became the first woman to serve as President of the State Bar of Georgia. She served as Chair of the Tort Trial and Insurance Practice Section of the American Bar Association from 2003 to 2004. She is the Immediate Past Chair of the Committee on Rules and Calendar of the House of Delegates of the American Bar Association and Chair of the Association's Coalition for Justice. She also currently holds numerous Board of Director positions, including Southface Energy Institute and Neighbor to Family. She is a Past President of the Board of Directors' Network, Past President of the Caucus of State Bars, and Past Chair of the Institute for Continuing Legal Education in Georgia and the Lawyers Foundation of Georgia.

Browning Marean
Senior Counsel, DLA Piper
Browning Marean is a member of the DLA Piper Litigation Group and is co-chair of the Electronic Discovery Readiness and Response Group. Mr. Marean serves on DLA Piper's Technology Committee and is an emeritus member of the California State Bar Law Practice Management Committee. He is a member of the San Diego County Bar Association Ethics Committee and the Sedona Conference.

Mr. Marean is a nationally known teacher and lecturer on various topics including electronic discovery, records retention, knowledge management and computer technology. He is co-author of the 2008 edition of Electronic Discovery and Records Management Guide, Rules, Checklists and Forms, published by Thomson West, and Conducting Discovery in an Electronic World: Electronic Data and Discovery, published by California Civil Discovery Practice. He has been named a San Diego Super Lawyer.

Mr. Marean received his law degree from the University of California, Hastings College of Law and his undergraduate degree from Stanford University. 

Douglass A. Mitchell

Counsel, Boies, Schiller & Flexner
Douglass A. Mitchell is an attorney with the law firm of Boies, Schiller & Flexner.  In 1995, the Federal District Court Judges in Nevada appointed him to be a mentor in the district’s criminal defense training program.  In his capacity as a mentor, he trains and prepares defense attorneys to practice criminal law in the United States District Court for the District of Nevada.  He has served as Chairman of the Attorney Advisory Committee on Implementation of CM/ECF electronic case filing system for the Federal District Court for the District of Nevada.  Mr. Mitchell has also been a member of the Local Working Group on Electronic Technology in the Criminal Justice System for the Federal District Court for the District of Nevada and is currently a member of the Administrative Office of the United States Courts Office of Defender Services Ad Hoc Expert Panel on Litigation Support in Criminal Justice Act Cases.

 Nigel Murray

 Managing Director, Trilantic

 Nigel Murray has been at the forefront of providing electronic document management services since the early 1990s. He began his career in legal technology as litigation support manager at a major London-based international law firm. He then started the first British litigation support company in 1993 - Bowhawk. There, he worked on the massive cases of the 90’s - tobacco, BCCI etc. From there, Nigel brought the electronic side of litigation support into an existing document management company by way of a merger.

Having worked on the first UK eDisclosure matter in 2001, Nigel has been at the forefront of the development of the industry within the major law firms in the UK. Nigel launched TRILANTIC in September of 2005 and speaks regularly on all aspects of eDiscovery in the US, the UK and mainland Europe. 

Tom O'Connor
Consultant/CEO Legal Electronic Document Institute
Tom O'Connor is a nationally known consultant, speaker and writer in the area of computerized litigation support systems. He is a New England native who graduated from The Johns Hopkins University in 1972 with a BA in Political Science and holds a J.D. degree.

Tom's involvement with large cases led him to become familiar with dozens of various software applications for litigation support and he has both designed databases and trained legal staffs. Tom has been on the faculty of numerous national CLE providers and currently teaches a course on legal technology in an ABA approved paralegal program at a local college. He is a member of the American Bar Foundation and the Governing Council of the Law Practice Management Section of the ABA. A frequent lecturer on legal technology, Tom has been on the faculty of numerous national CLE providers and is a member of the advisory board of the national LegalTech conferences. A prolific writer with articles in numerous legal publications, he is the Editor of several legal newsletters. Tom is the author of The Automated Law Firm, a guide to computer systems and software (Aspen Law & Business), now in its fourth edition and The Lawyers Guide to Summation, published by the ABA.

Patrick Oot
Director of Electronic Discovery & Sr. Litigation, Counsel Verizon Communications
Patrick is Director of Electronic Discovery and Senior Litigation Counsel at Verizon in Washington, D.C. Inside Counsel Magazine named Verizon's e-discovery team as one of the ten most innovative legal groups of 2006 and 2007. Patrick has extensive experience in discovery practices involving commercial litigation, regulatory filings, and antitrust matters. He is charged with advising Verizon's business units on electronic discovery while developing new technologies and strategies that meet the goals of Rule 1 of The Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. He has also testified as Verizon's 30(b)(6) witness for discovery-related inquiries in other matters. Patrick has testified before the United States Judicial Conference's Advisory Committee on the Federal Rules of Evidence where he presented Verizon's position and contributed language included in its draft to the Judicial Conference. Patrick actively participates in The Sedona Conference® Working Group on Electronic Document Retention and Product. He lectures regularly at educational events, legal conferences, and general counsel round tables internationally.

Herb Roitblat, Ph.D.
Principal, OrcaTec LLC