Mr. Richard J. Grad served as a Partner at Sidley Austin LLP (Alternate name: Sidley Austin Brown & Wood) since 1991 and has practiced with it from 1985. Mr. Grad's practice has focused on complex civil litigation with particular emphasis in the fields of class action defense, antitrust, securities, patent and intellectual property litigation. He served as Global Co-Chair of Financial Services Class Action Litigation practice for Museum of Contemporary Art, Inc. since March 15, 2011. He serves as a Trustee of Museum of Contemporary Art, Inc. Mr. Grad has represented numerous major corporations, including First Data Corporation, Western Union, AT&T, SGS-Thompson, and NCR Corporation in cases involving fraud, copyright, trademark, patent, and intellectual property issues. Mr. Grad has been involved in successfully defeating class certification motions in both state and federal courts, most recently in a major fraud action involving a big five accounting firm. Mr. Grad is lead counsel for First Data Corporation, Western Union Financial Services, and Orlandi Valuta in a series of large consumer class action lawsuits pending in various Federal and State courts across the country involving the defendants' international money transmission services. He is also lead counsel for First Data Corporation and Card Services International in several patent cases, and has also recently represented the Mayo Foundation, the Mayo Clinic, the Foundation for Blood Research and the Arizona Institute for Genetic and Fetal Medicine in various bio-tech litigation and other matters. Mr. Grad has written articles on a variety of subjects, including patent, copyright, trademark, and antitrust law, as well as federal civil procedure. Mr. Grad earned a B.A., summa cum laude, in 1980 from the University of California at Los Angeles, where he was a member of Phi Beta Kappa. He earned a Juris Doctorate degree in 1983 from Northeastern University School of Law. Following graduation from law school, Mr. Grad served as a law clerk to the Honorable Howard G. Munson, Chief Judge of the United States District Court, Northern District of New York. Mr. Grad has been a member of the American Bar Association's Litigation Section, Federal Civil Procedure Committee and of the American Bar Association's Commercial and Banking Litigation Committee, and he has represented the State Bar of California on a pro bono basis in constitutional litigation matters. He is also a member of the American Intellectual Property Law Association, the Los Angeles County Bar Association, and the Association of Business Trial Lawyers.
