Alan B. Vickery

Partner
New York City

t: 212 446 2345
f: 212 446 2350

avickery@bsfllp.com

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Areas of Practice

Litigation

Antitrust

Securities Litigation

Sports Law

White-Collar /
Business Crimes

Education

Columbia University, J.D., 1983; James Kent Scholar (1980-81); Harlan Fiske Stone Scholar (1981-82 and 1982-83); Notes and Comments Editor, Columbia Law Review

Amherst College, B.A., magna cum laude, American Studies, 1976

Clerkships

Associate Justice William H. Rehnquist, United States Supreme Court, 1984-1985

Chief Judge Wilfred Feinberg, United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, 1983-1984

Admissions

New York

United States Supreme Court

United States Courts of Appeal: Second, Fourth and Federal Circuits

United States District Courts: Southern and Eastern Districts of New York

Alan Vickery, a former federal prosecutor, has conducted numerous jury trials in federal district court and arguments in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. His main practice area is complex business litigation, including antitrust, securities, insurance, regulatory investigations and white collar defense. His practice also includes defamation litigation.

Mr. Vickery has handled several widely publicized antitrust and contract cases related to professional sports and media. He represented the Yankees Entertainment & Sports Network against Cablevision, Time Warner Cable and other cable and satellite carriers in antitrust and carriage disputes; NASCAR in a $1 billion antitrust challenge over NASCAR's business model and allocation of Nextel Cup race dates to Texas Motor Speedway; the New York Yankees in litigation with MSG Network over the long-term broadcast rights to Yankees games; German media mogul Leo Kirch in litigation against Liberty Cable and Deutsche Bank over the collapse of KirchGroup, Germany's largest media conglomerate; and the highest bidder in the sale of the Washington Redskins Football Club by the Estate of Jack Kent Cooke in litigation related to the NFL's failure to approve the sale.

Mr. Vickery also has represented Zurich Financial Services and several of its subsidiaries in a wide range of cases and arbitrations involving complex structured products, insurance, reinsurance, derivatives and securities. These include litigation with domestic and off-shore hedge funds over securities fraud and diverted assets, as well as litigation related to domestic and foreign insolvencies and bankruptcies of counterparties.

Other representative clients for which Mr. Vickery has handled significant litigation include Goldman Sachs, John Hancock, Solow Building Company and Trizec Properties.

Mr. Vickery has also successfully represented corporations in non-public SEC enforcement investigations and other federal and state regulatory and criminal investigations.

Prior to joining the firm as a partner in early 1999, Mr. Vickery served for seven years as an Assistant United States Attorney in the Criminal Division of the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of New York, where he conducted and supervised numerous grand jury investigations and trials, including major securities and insurance fraud cases. In 1997 he was appointed Chief of the Business and Securities Fraud Section of that Office.

Major criminal trials and appellate arguments handled by Mr. Vickery include United States v. John Brennan and U.S. Aviation Underwriters, a 7-week insurance fraud trial arising out of a commercial airline crash near Los Angeles, see 938 F. Supp. 1111 (E.D.N.Y. 1996), and appeal, 183 F.3rd 139 (1999)(reversed on venue grounds); United States v. Paul Russo, et al., an eleven-week stock manipulation trial, and appeal, 64 F.3d 1383 (2d Cir. 1995)(Second Circuit expanded scope of "in connection with" element of SEC Rule 10b-5); United States v. Santos Negron, et al., 3-week trial of members of large-scale "crack" cocaine manufacturing and distribution organization on continuing-criminal-enterprise, drug trafficking and weapons charges, and appeal; United States v. Renaldo Rodriguez, indictment of suspected hit man on federal weapons charges, 841 F. Supp. 79 (E.D.N.Y. 1994), and appeal, 53 F.3d 545 (2d Cir. 1984)(interpreted scope of statute prohibiting carrying or using firearm equipped with a silencer during and in relation to drug trafficking offense). Press coverage of the Brennan and Russo cases included, respectively, "Taking a Hard Line Amid the Wreckage, " Sunday New York Times, Money and Business Section, p. 1 (10/6/96), and "Second Circuit's Broad View of Manipulation," New York Law Journal, p. 1 (3/28/96).

Significant grand jury investigations and convictions include United States v. Dov Engel, et al. ($115 million bank fraud); United States v. Lester Coleman (perjury in connection with Pan Am - Lockerbie civil litigation; Coleman purported to offer first-hand support for false defense theory that U.S. government agents negligently allowed terrorists to smuggle a bomb on board Pan Am Flight 103 by infiltrating secret government operation, featured in Time Magazine cover story 4/27/92); United States v. Peter Caserta, et al. (investment banking advance fee scheme by founder of Spectrum Technologies); United States v. Michael Strugats (medicare and insurance fraud); and In Re Richard Roe, 168 F.3d 69 (2d Cir. 1999)(scope of crime-fraud exception to attorney-client privilege in grand jury investigation).

Before joining the United States Attorney's Office, Mr. Vickery was associated with Cravath, Swaine & Moore, where he was involved in all phases of complex commercial litigation, including in major cases for Continental Airlines, IBM, Polaroid, Salomon Brothers, Price Waterhouse, Westinghouse Electric Corp., the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation/Resolution Trust Corporation, and Avis. .

Selected Professional Awards and Associations

Executive Office of U.S. Attorneys, United States Deptartment of Justice, Director's Award for Superior Performance in 1994 and 1997
American Bar Association
New York State Bar Association
New York City Bar Association

Selected Publications

Note, Breach of Confidence: An Emerging Tort, 82 Colum. L. Rev. 1426 (1982) (cited by numerous federal and state courts, including the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and the highest courts of Oregon (in banc), Virginia, Ohio, South Carolina and the District of Columbia)

A.B.A. White Collar Section, San Francisco, Cal. 1999, Criminalizing Breach of Fiduciary Duties

A.B.A. White Collar Section, San Francisco, Cal. 1998, Reinsurance Fraud, U.S. v. John Brennan and United States Aviation Underwriters

Andrews Publications Annual International Reinsurance Conference, Cambridge, Mass. 1997, Reinsurance Fraud Based on Fiduciary Duties, U.S. v. John Brennan and United States Aviation Underwriters

Columbia University Law School White Collar Seminar (Prof. John Coffee), 1995, 1997 and 1998, Guest Lecturer

Fordham Law School White Collar Crimes Seminar, 1994, Guest Lecturer

A.B.A. Antitrust Section, Section 1 Committee, Washington, D. C. 1989, Essential Facility Doctrine in Airline Computer Reservation Systems Antitrust Litigation, Continental Airlines v. American Airlines and United Airlines