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June 8, 2001/Sivan 17, 5761, Vol. 53, No.36
Local attorney coordinates 'looking forward to past'
JESSICA BARBER
Editorial Intern
More than 1,000 trial lawyers dedicated to promoting domestic and international justice met May 9-12 for the 2001 annual meeting of the American Bar Association Section of Litigation at the Phoenician in Scottsdale.
The seminar, with a theme "Looking Forward to the Past," attracted lawyers from across the country to discuss such topics as the growing use of technology in trials, reducing the backlog of child abuse and neglect cases, and analysis of expert witnesses in cases against hospitals and HMOs.
Phoenix attorney Ronald Jay Cohen coordinated the seminar, which reportedly had the largest turnout in the history of the ABA Section of Litigation meetings.
"The conference was great fun," Cohen said. "We had fantastic speakers and everyone had a chance to network professionally."
Elected chairman of the ABA Section of Litigation in July 2000, Cohen has dedicated his one-year term to 26 major initiatives, including diversity of the legal profession, expanding ethics training for attorneys and guiding third world countries in the transition to the rule of law.
The ABA Section of Litigation includes trial lawyers, judges and others involved in all aspects of litigation and the dispute resolution process.
"We made the first guidelines to ethical settlements ever," Cohen said. "There has never been a composite of guidelines for settlement or a guide of what we can and cannot say during negotiations."
Cohen co-founded Cohen Kennedy Dowd & Quigley, a Phoenix-based commercial litigation law firm, in June 1991 and continues to make advances in the legal profession in commercial business dispute cases, diversity, ethics and training.
As chairman and co-founding partner of his firm, Cohen handles multi-million dollar business disputes that arise in contractual settings, unfair competition, breach of contract and false advertising.
Prior to his position at Cohen Kennedy Dowd & Quigley, Cohen spent 19 years at Streich Lang, now Quarles Brady Streich Lang, where he became a senior litigation partner. Also at Streich Lang, he represented U-HAUL in a false advertising case that won the largest plaintiff's verdict in the history of false advertising cases.
Cohen arrived in the Valley in 1972, shortly after earning his juris doctorate from the University of Minnesota. He received a bachelor's degree in 1970 from the University of Wisconsin.
Cohen has a long history of community involvement in the Valley, including an appointment as Adjunct Professor of Law in Evidence to Arizona State University School of Law in 1980.
His two stepsons, Brad and Daniel Durchslag, both reside in Phoenix. Brad recently graduated from college and Daniel is a practicing business lawyer.
Cohen expressed his deep ties to the community and the people within it. "I feel so good about the Valley and I am blessed to be here," Cohen said. "I work with wonderful people and I am very proud of being Jewish and of being a part of the community."
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