The following is an excerpt from Practice Perspectives: Vault's Guide to Legal Practice Areas.
Evelyn Cai, Associate, and Grace Brier, Partner—Litigation
Evelyn Cai is a fourth-year litigation associate at Kirkland & Ellis in Chicago, focusing on litigating complex commercial cases. She has represented clients at both trial and appellate levels in suits ranging from single-plaintiff claims to far-reaching antitrust class actions. Evelyn graduated from Yale Law School and received her B.A. in Economics and Philosophy from the University of Chicago.
Grace Brier is a litigation partner in the Washington, DC, office of Kirkland & Ellis. Grace’s practice focuses on complex civil disputes in federal courts, state courts, and arbitrations across the country. She has experience representing clients in matters involving contract disputes, class actions, fraud claims, restructuring matters, and government-facing litigation and investigations. Grace also maintains an active pro bono practice.
Describe your practice area and what it entails.
Evelyn: The litigation group at Kirkland & Ellis offers a wide variety of practice opportunities. These opportunities range from incredibly complex commercial cases (i.e., antitrust class actions and multi-district litigations) to bankruptcies involving major companies to fast-paced arbitrations and more. Because Kirkland & Ellis follows an open assignment system, litigation associates can—in fact, are encouraged to—work on cases that range in type and subject matter.
Grace: I work on litigation matters that come in the door at various stages of the case, from pre-complaint fact development work through discovery, pre-trial, and trial work. I often find myself working on tasks at all stages of the discovery lifecycle, from scoping the potential facts and relevant witnesses in order to understand the story early in the case, to intensive document, deposition, and expert discovery, to trial preparation and trial.
What types of clients do you represent?
Evelyn: All thanks to the diversity of cases that Kirkland & Ellis gets, my clients range significantly. On one end of the spectrum, I help represent a Fortune 500 company tackling everything from small breach-of-contract disputes to sprawling class-action suits. On the other end of the spectrum, I recently represented a young mother in her civil suit against state actors.
Grace: At any given time, I usually represent a varied slate of clients, ranging from large companies to individuals. I have represented defendants in large multi-district litigations, clients facing class action lawsuits, companies navigating chapter 11 bankruptcies, and companies litigating post-bankruptcy disputes. I have also represented individuals or companies who are under investigation by various government bodies.
In my pro bono practice, I have represented individuals on death row in habeas proceedings and evidentiary hearings.
What types of cases/deals do you work on?
Evelyn: I spend most of my time working on breach-of-contract disputes. One was featured in The American Lawyer. In that case—Endless River Tech. v. TransUnion—Kirkland was retained just months before a federal jury trial. With persistent motion practice and creative legal strategy, we were able to turn a $55 million damages claim into a zero damages judgment.
Pro bono is also very important to me. I was part of a trial team that secured a $19.3 million verdict for a single plaintiff in a Section 1983 case involving sexual abuse at an Illinois female prison. This historic verdict was featured in the Chicago Tribune and The American Lawyer.
Grace: As a general litigator, I work on many different types of cases. I really appreciate Kirkland’s focus on training its litigators to develop litigation skills early that can be applied across varied issues and matters.
How did you choose this practice area?
Evelyn: In law school, I gravitated towards the opportunities that put me closest to real trials—working at the U.S. Attorney’s Office and the Federal Public Defender’s Office. I found these internships to be the most exciting and substantively engaging parts of law school. While I was certain that I wanted to work in litigation, Kirkland also provided me with the flexibility as a summer associate to try out restructuring work and to participate in a mock corporate negotiation.
Grace: I found myself drawn to the practice area based on discussions with lawyers who practiced in litigation and really seemed passionate about their practice and their cases. I also found that I enjoyed a lot of the litigation-focused classes and skills-based experiences in law school, like mock trial.
What is a typical day like and/or what are some common tasks you perform?
Evelyn: A typical day depends heavily on the key cases you are working on and the procedural posture of those cases. When cases are pre-litigation, a normal day would involve critically thinking about case strategy and weighing options informed by case law research. As a case moves on to the fact discovery period, associates are frequently given the opportunity to take and defend depositions. And before a trial, I’m drafting pre-trial motions, preparing exhibits and witness outlines, and jury testing.
Grace: It’s hard to describe a “typical” day. I tend to be in trial prep or at trial at least once a year, if not more. Of course, those pre-trial and trial days are anything but typical. At other times, cases are in active discovery and involve a lot of travel and depositions as we’re deposing or defending witnesses. Whether we’re on the road or in the office, I’m often checking emails to be sure I’m up to date on the latest case developments, questions, or thoughts from clients or team members, and putting together some to-do lists for myself and my teams. While the days can be unpredictable, the variety keeps them interesting.
What training, classes, experience, or skills development would you recommend to someone who wishes to enter your practice area?
Evelyn: At Kirkland & Ellis, associates are given substantive opportunities right out of the gate; taking courses that mirror litigation work, legal writing courses, moot court, or trial advocacy courses are particularly helpful. Clinics typically offer another great opportunity to get stand-up litigation experience while in law school. There is no need to limit yourself to your school’s offerings; volunteering with local legal aid organizations or shadowing attorneys at public defenders’ or prosecutors’ offices can be extremely valuable, too.
Grace: Get involved in skills-based classes or activities, like moot court or mock trial, and devote the time and energy to those activities to make them as educational—and fun—as possible. I joined a mock trial competition during my 1L year in law school. I really enjoyed it and continued to compete in mock trial competitions throughout law school, which are absolutely some of my favorite memories. It’s a fantastic way to get on-your-feet experience, so much so that Kirkland does a mock trial training program with its litigation associates every year as part of its Kirkland Institute for Trial Advocacy (KITA) training program.
What is the most challenging aspect of practicing in this area?
Evelyn: Figuring out how to say “no.” Junior associates have so many options—be it with the types of cases they can take on or the partners they can work for—that it can be hard to know when to turn an option down. Being able to focus and commit to a core set of cases will allow you to dig in deeply and provide value to your team. Luckily, this is a challenge for many litigators, and partners at Kirkland & Ellis are more than open to helping associates navigate it.
What misconceptions exist about your practice area?
Evelyn: One common misconception about being a litigation associate is that you spend the first several years performing legal research and document review. At Kirkland, this could not be further from the truth. Several friends at the firm were given the opportunity to take depositions when they had only been practicing for one or two years, and others were able to direct examine or cross examine witnesses at trial as juniors.
What is unique about your practice area at your firm?
Evelyn: It’s Kirkland’s commitment to excellence. At every step, the firm provides associates with the tools and encouragement to be the best lawyers they can be. This includes formal training programs like the KITA where junior associates can practice running trials in front of a live jury, and robust formal mentoring that starts with summer associates and continues throughout your time at the firm.
How do you see this practice area evolving in the future?
Evelyn: With every case, our firm pushes the bounds of litigation further with new strategies and techniques. I’m excited to see how the litigation landscape evolves, but more importantly, the role Kirkland & Ellis plays in that evolution.