About Perry Weitz

It can cause even the most ruthless corporate CEO to tug nervously at his shirt collar and gulp hard when told that squaring off against him in court will be the brawny, knock-out-king of a law firm co-founded in 1986 by super attorney Perry Weitz, Esq.

Mr. Weitz — bold and resolute, relentlessly so — is a clenched-jaw champion of justice for the little guy. Always has been, always will be.

No surprise to learn then, that, early in his career, he gained a reputation as the kind of plaintiffs’ attorney capable of convincing corporations prone to digging-in their heels to instead put a case to rest quickly by settling out of court (and, in so doing, spare themselves a devastating confrontation with him in front of a jury).

After launching Weitz & Luxenberg, Mr. Weitz took care to populate the firm with attorneys who shared not only his impassioned views about the price corporations and wealthy individuals must pay for their negligent or willful acts committed against the innocent, but who also shared his energy, his enthusiasm and — above all — his extraordinary depth of understanding about what is possible under the law and along the outermost edges of its continually shifting contours.

U.S. presidents have sought his advice. Likewise legislators, academicians, nonprofit business managers, association leaders, charity directors and many others. The reason is simple: Perry Weitz is a man of ideas, with the clarity of vision that makes his a voice much sought-after — and sought-after in particular by those who lack a voice of their own.

Case in point: 36 shipyard workers dying or dead of the terrifying, aggressive cancer known as mesothelioma, which each of them contracted after being exposed on the job to the toxic mineral asbestos. Outraged over the story of unconscionable suffering and loss told by each victim at their first meeting with him, Mr. Weitz lost no time building a powerful case against the operators of the Brooklyn, N.Y., shipyard where the injuries occurred. So determined was he to win this for the workers that he put practically everything on the line — including his own home, mortgaged to raise money to cover the costs of legal research and evidence gathering. He proceeded despite the skepticism of some veteran members of the personal-injury establishment, who believed the case hopeless and were sure Mr. Weitz would find only ruin in the end.

Instead, what Mr. Weitz found was victory — and a stunning $75-million award for the shipyard workers to compensate them for their massive medical bills, lost wages, pain and suffering, and more.

Mr. Weitz remembers the case as physically and emotionally exhausting, in part because it was tried simultaneously in two different courts — one at the state level, the other at the federal. He also remembers it as worth every last drop of sweat and tears, for it delivered justice far beyond the expectations of the victims. However, the case accomplished something more. It made plain that Perry Weitz and his young firm were together a force with which to be reckoned.