Steven Toll
Cohen Milstein
1100 New York Avenue NW, Suite 500
Washington, DC 20005
(202) 408-4600
www.cohenmilstein.com
Steven J. Toll joined the Firm in 1979 and has been lead or principal counsel in some of the most highly publicized stock fraud cases for over 30 years. He has been Managing Partner of the Firm since 1997 and is co-chair of the Securities Fraud/Investor Protection practice group. Mr. Toll was profiled in the February 1996 Washington Business Journal as one of five attorneys that stand out as the “cream of the crop” in the Washington D.C. legal community. Lawdragon named him as one of the 500 Leading Lawyers in America in 2006-07-08, as well as naming him one of the 100 Lawyers You Need to Know in Securities Litigation in 2008. In 2010, Mr. Toll was selected Law360's "Most Admired Attorneys" and in 2012 and 2013, he was selected as a "Leading Plaintiffs Star in the District of Columbia" by Benchmark: Litigation, the Guide to America’s Leading Litigation Firms and Attorneys.
In July 2005, Mr. Toll was lead trial counsel in one of the few securities class actions to go to trial involving Globalstar, a satellite manufacturer. Mr. Toll successfully argued the motions before and during trial and ultimately achieved a settlement of $20 million shortly before the case was scheduled to go to the jury. In approving the settlement, U.S. District Judge Kevin Castel remarked that Mr. Toll and his colleagues had “done a terrific job in presenting the case for the plaintiffs.”
Mr. Toll is co-lead counsel in the largest case ever resolved involving mortgage-backed securities, the case against Countrywide. That case ultimately settled, after years of vigorous litigation and multiple legal challenges, for $500 million in 2013. Some of Mr. Toll’s other notable cases include those against Lucent Technologies, which was settled in 2001 for approximately $575 million, at the time, the second largest securities class action settlement ever achieved; Converium, where he negotiated a global settlement in the U.S. courts and the courts in Amsterdam of $135 million; MF Global, where he helped negotiate a settlement of $90 million; Southmark Securities Litigation, where he helped achieve a settlement of $70 million from the company’s auditors, Drexel Burnham and Michael Milken; Norman v. Salomon Smith Barney, where he negotiated a $50 million settlement on behalf of customers of Salomon’s Guided Portfolio Management Program, who alleged that Salomon invested their money in companies in order to boost Salomon’s investment banking business.
Mr. Toll also served as co-lead counsel in one of the most publicized frauds of the 1990s -- Cascade International (S.D. Fla.) where the mastermind of the fraud, Victor Incendy, is still a fugitive from justice. The case settled on the eve of trial against Raymond James Inc. -- the only securities class action ever successfully litigated against a brokerage firm for its role as a research analyst.
Mr. Toll is currently co-lead counsel in the BP Securities Litigation, a major case stemming out of the Deepwater Horizon explosion in 2010 and BP's process safety disclosures. He led the Firm’s team as co-lead counsel in one of the most highly publicized fraud cases of this era, the securities fraud class action involving Parmalat, the Italian dairy manufacturer; the case is known as Europe’s “Enron,” because of the similarities of the fraudulent schemes and the non-existence of billions of dollars of assets that had been recorded on Parmalat’s financial statements. That case was settled for $90 million. He was also lead counsel in a mortgage-backed securities case against Lehman Brothers that settled for $40 million.
He has written for and spoken at various conferences about securities law and corporate governance issues, including, inter alia, The Plaintiffs’ Perspective, Securities Regulation and the New Law, National Legal Center for the Public Interest, No. 1, Sept. 1996; The Sarbanes-Oxley Bill Provides No Assistance To Investors Seeking To Recovery From Corporate Fraud, ABA Annual Meeting, August 2002; The Analyst Cases Involving Merrill Lynch, and Its Internet Analyst Henry Blodget, and Salomon Smith Barney and Its Telecommunications Analyst Jack Grubman, Mass Torts Made Perfect (presented January 2003); and Coming to Terms with Loss Causation after Dura: A Response to Professors Portnoy, Ferrell, and Saha, The Journal of Corporation Law, Fall 2009.
Mr. Toll is an honors graduate of the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania (B.S., Accounting, cum laude, 1972). He graduated from Georgetown University Law Center (J.D., 1975) where he was Special Project Editor of the Tax Lawyer.
In July 2005, Mr. Toll was lead trial counsel in one of the few securities class actions to go to trial involving Globalstar, a satellite manufacturer. Mr. Toll successfully argued the motions before and during trial and ultimately achieved a settlement of $20 million shortly before the case was scheduled to go to the jury. In approving the settlement, U.S. District Judge Kevin Castel remarked that Mr. Toll and his colleagues had “done a terrific job in presenting the case for the plaintiffs.”
Mr. Toll is co-lead counsel in the largest case ever resolved involving mortgage-backed securities, the case against Countrywide. That case ultimately settled, after years of vigorous litigation and multiple legal challenges, for $500 million in 2013. Some of Mr. Toll’s other notable cases include those against Lucent Technologies, which was settled in 2001 for approximately $575 million, at the time, the second largest securities class action settlement ever achieved; Converium, where he negotiated a global settlement in the U.S. courts and the courts in Amsterdam of $135 million; MF Global, where he helped negotiate a settlement of $90 million; Southmark Securities Litigation, where he helped achieve a settlement of $70 million from the company’s auditors, Drexel Burnham and Michael Milken; Norman v. Salomon Smith Barney, where he negotiated a $50 million settlement on behalf of customers of Salomon’s Guided Portfolio Management Program, who alleged that Salomon invested their money in companies in order to boost Salomon’s investment banking business.
Mr. Toll also served as co-lead counsel in one of the most publicized frauds of the 1990s -- Cascade International (S.D. Fla.) where the mastermind of the fraud, Victor Incendy, is still a fugitive from justice. The case settled on the eve of trial against Raymond James Inc. -- the only securities class action ever successfully litigated against a brokerage firm for its role as a research analyst.
Mr. Toll is currently co-lead counsel in the BP Securities Litigation, a major case stemming out of the Deepwater Horizon explosion in 2010 and BP's process safety disclosures. He led the Firm’s team as co-lead counsel in one of the most highly publicized fraud cases of this era, the securities fraud class action involving Parmalat, the Italian dairy manufacturer; the case is known as Europe’s “Enron,” because of the similarities of the fraudulent schemes and the non-existence of billions of dollars of assets that had been recorded on Parmalat’s financial statements. That case was settled for $90 million. He was also lead counsel in a mortgage-backed securities case against Lehman Brothers that settled for $40 million.
He has written for and spoken at various conferences about securities law and corporate governance issues, including, inter alia, The Plaintiffs’ Perspective, Securities Regulation and the New Law, National Legal Center for the Public Interest, No. 1, Sept. 1996; The Sarbanes-Oxley Bill Provides No Assistance To Investors Seeking To Recovery From Corporate Fraud, ABA Annual Meeting, August 2002; The Analyst Cases Involving Merrill Lynch, and Its Internet Analyst Henry Blodget, and Salomon Smith Barney and Its Telecommunications Analyst Jack Grubman, Mass Torts Made Perfect (presented January 2003); and Coming to Terms with Loss Causation after Dura: A Response to Professors Portnoy, Ferrell, and Saha, The Journal of Corporation Law, Fall 2009.
Mr. Toll is an honors graduate of the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania (B.S., Accounting, cum laude, 1972). He graduated from Georgetown University Law Center (J.D., 1975) where he was Special Project Editor of the Tax Lawyer.