Profile: James E Lyons

Commercial Litigation

Biography: Commercial Litigation

James E Lyons is the co-head of Skadden's west coast litigation department, which is comprised of the firm's San Francisco, Palo Alto and Los Angeles litigation groups. Mr Lyons's litigation practice emphasises securities and corporate issues, directors' and officers' liability, international arbitration and other complex commercial disputes.

Mr Lyons has represented several major public corporations and financial institutions in corporate control contests on the West Coast and regularly represents clients in shareholder class action and derivative suits. He has defended public corporations and corporate officers and directors against claims involving disclosure issues in public filings and press releases and in challenges to directors' business judgment in a wide variety of industries, ranging from aerospace to utilities. He has also defended financial institutions against significant claims involving complex financial transactions, including conservation of insurance companies, prime brokerage and the trading of derivatives.

Mr Lyons's recent work includes representing Apollo Advisors in its successful appeal to the California Supreme Court. In addition, Mr Lyons has represented McKesson Corporation in class action securities litigation and related state court litigation arising out of accounting improprieties discovered by McKesson following its acquisition of HBO & Co.

Mr Lyons is also in the centre of a number of matters related to the backdating of stock options, including the representation of corporate officers and board members involved in internal investigations and shareholder litigation relating to the stock option approval process. On two occasions, Mr Lyons and his team obtained letters from the staff of the Securities and Exchange Commission informing the client that it was closing its inquiry and would recommend no enforcement action.

Over the past few years, Mr Lyons has taken the lead role in complex international arbitration for clients in the United Kingdom, Indonesia, the Philippines and Singapore.

In the intellectual property area, Mr Lyons defended a company against a claim brought by the Hells Angels alleging violation of their trademark, and litigated a dispute over the rights to 'Layla' by Derek and the Dominoes. Mr Lyons also has experience in civil RICO and multifaceted civil fraud litigation, representing both plaintiffs and defendants.