Frederick P. Santarelli
BLUE BELL
(215) 977-1024
fpsantarelli@elliottgreenleaf.com
Frederick P. Santarelli has been a shareholder in the firm since 1996, after having joined as an associate in 1990. He has extensive experience in trial and appellate litigation in federal and state courts, for plaintiffs and defendants, in multiple and diverse areas of the law. In addition to court-appointed lead class counsel on the plaintiff side of class actions, Mr. Santarelli has been lead defense counsel in numerous cases, including corporate director and officer claims for hundreds of millions of dollars, as well as lead counsel in complex insurance insolvency litigations. Mr. Santarelli has also litigated class actions across the country under the Multi-District Litigation rules.
The breadth of cases he has litigated includes complex business and commercial disputes; health care financing and contracting disputes; disputes among managed care and health insurance companies; disputes involving physician contracts; employment and labor relations disputes (both employee and company representations); ERISA and employee benefits claims (both employee and employer/ERISA Plan representations); insurance disputes, including insurance insolvency matters and insurance coverage disputes; health care and insurance fraud litigation; injunctions enforcing restrictive covenants and non-compete obligations, as well as injunctions to enforce other contractual rights and business interests; business torts and interference claims; white collar criminal defense; civil and criminal racketeering cases; bankruptcy fraud cases; corporate director and officer liability; government agencies' disputes; civil rights litigations.
Mr. Santarelli has argued before the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania as well as the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit. He presented the winning oral arguments in the nationally-significant Fair Labor Standards Act class action, De Asencio, et al. v. Tyson Foods, Inc., 500 F.3d 361 (3d Cir. 2007), cert. denied, ___ U.S.___ (2008); as well as in the precedent-setting case of Ario v. Ingram Micro et al. (PA. Supreme Ct., 2009), establishing important precedent for insurance policyholders, insurance companies and insurance company receiverships.
Before joining the firm in 1990, Mr. Santarelli. served a judicial clerkship with the President Judge of the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania, a court with both trial and appellate jurisdiction in complex litigations across the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Building upon his judicial clerkship experience, Mr. Santarelli has developed an extensive background in practicing before the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania, in both the Court’s original and the appellate jurisdiction, including as lead counsel in defending director and officer liability claims by the Insurance Commissioner alleging hundreds of millions of dollars in damages (PHICO liquidation); successfully defending multi-million dollar claims by the Insurance Commissioner in the Reliance liquidation; and defending and pursuing claims against the Commissioner in the Legion liquidation.
Mr. Santarelli has also tried cases before governmental and administrative agencies, as well as commercial arbitration matters under the American Arbitration Association rules and the American Health Lawyers Association rules, including a defense verdict, after 22 days of trial, on contract and related commercial claims seeking over $10,000,000 in alleged damages.
Mr. Santarelli has served as a speaker on the faculty of the Pennsylvania Bar Institute for Continuing Legal Education, speaking on the complex issues that arise in class action litigation under federal and state wage and hour laws ("Tough Issues in Wage & Hour Law ", Pennsylvania Bar Institute, March 2003), and also co-authoring other materials for Continuing Legal Education Seminars.
For over 10 years, Mr. Santarelli has received an AV® peer review rating, which is the highest such rating available to an individual lawyer, reflecting professional excellence and highest levels of professional legal skills, ethics and integrity. Mr. Santarelli has been selected as one of Pennsylvania's "SuperLawyers" (as recognized in Philadelphia Magazine and the Pennsylvania SuperLawyers publications) in every year in which the designation has been awarded since 2004, based on a statewide poll of over 35,000 Judges and lawyers selecting the top 5% of all Pennsylvania lawyers. Mr. Santarelli is also a Fellow of Litigation Counsel of America, an invitation-only nationwide trial lawyer honorary society whose Membership is limited to 3,500 Fellows, representing less than one-half of one percent of American lawyers.
Mr. Santarelli graduated from the Widener University School of Law in 1988. While working full-time throughout law school, Mr. Santarelli graduated cum laude, served as an editor of the law review, and published an article that has been cited in several judicial opinions (Santarelli, Preliminary Injunctions In Delaware: The Need for A Clearer Standard, 13 Del.J.Corp.L. 107 (1988)). His undergraduate degree is from Juniata College in Huntingdon, Pennsylvania, majoring in Business Administration and graduating in 1984. At Juniata, Mr. Santarelli was selected most valuable lineman and co-MVP of the varsity football team.
He graduated from Saint Joseph 's Preparatory High School in Philadelphia, in 1980. Mr. Santarelli has remained a long-term resident of South Philadelphia.
He is a member of the Bars of the Supreme Court of the United States of America, the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, the Supreme Court of New Jersey, the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit and the United States District Courts for the Eastern and Middle Districts of Pennsylvania.
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