Michael is a commercial litigator and strategic adviser whose practice focuses on complex business disputes, investigations, and appellate matters. He represents companies, financial institutions, executives, entrepreneurs, and other clients in matters involving securities, contracts, business torts, employment, trade secrets, antitrust, corporate governance, and regulatory issues. Michael works with clients to assess risk early, define practical objectives, and carry matters through pleadings, discovery, motion practice, expert issues, trial preparation, and appeal.

Michael brings particular strength to matters involving extensive factual records, difficult legal questions, and overlapping litigation and business considerations. His experience includes defending companies and officers in securities and derivative litigation; advising companies and boards in internal and governmental investigations; litigating contract, employment, trade-secret, and fraudulent-transfer disputes; and developing antitrust compliance and transaction guidance. He has handled complex discovery, ESI, privilege, sanctions, expert, and appellate issues and has drafted dispositive, discovery, evidentiary, expert-exclusion, and appellate submissions in state and federal matters..

Before joining Rottenberg Lipman Rich, Michael practiced at Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, where he worked on complex securities litigation, white-collar defense, internal and governmental investigations, labor and employment disputes, breach-of-contract matters, criminal antitrust, and trade-secret litigation. His work included developing litigation strategy, drafting federal and state-court submissions, leading factual-development and investigation workstreams, preparing witness materials, managing discovery and privilege issues, and responding to regulatory inquiries.

Before entering private practice, Michael served as a law clerk to Judge Barrington D. Parker, Jr. of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and Judge Colleen McMahon of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York.

Michael earned his J.D. from Harvard Law School, where he served as President of the Harvard Law Review and represented indigent clients through the Criminal Justice Institute. He earned his B.A., magna cum laude, from Princeton University, where he was a Mellon Mays Fellow. Michael is the co-author, with Professor Tabatha Abu El-Haj, of “Fusion and the Freedom to Associate to a Better Politics,” published in Volume 74 of the Kansas Law Review.

Before law school, Michael taught history and worked in New York City government on initiatives to expand public contracting opportunities for minority- and women-owned businesses. He also co-founded a clean-water venture backed by Princeton University’s Entrepreneurship Lab. Michael later founded Positive Deviance NYC, an arts-and-culture organization that produces live programming and develops clean-air infrastructure for public and private events. His experience as an entrepreneur, educator, and public servant informs his practical approach to counseling businesses and individuals.