Steven P. Harte, Senior Associate

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Mr. Harte joined Block & Leviton in December 2011 as a Senior Associate.  Mr. Harte focuses his practice on securities litigation and consumer protection issues.  Prior to joining Block & Leviton, Mr. Harte was an attorney at Choate Hall & Stewart, LLP, where he was a core member of the litigation and government enforcement practice groups.  He has held lead associate responsibility in a number of securities and antitrust matters.  He began his career in the New York office of Jones Day, one of the largest law firms in the world.

Mr. Harte is currently representing the Ohio Pension Funds in the securities class action In re BP plc Securities Litigation, 4:10-md-02185 (S.D. Tex.), where he is working to recover investor losses related to the largest oil spill in United States history.  He is also a lead or co-lead attorney in a number of securities class action shareholder rights actions, including: In Re: Cybex Int'l, Inc., In Re: MIPS Techs., Inc., and represents the Louisiana Police Municipal Employees' Retirement System (LMPERS) in their pending litigation against Plains Exploration & Production Co.  Mr. Harte also successfully represented LMPERS in an action arising out of Sunoco, Inc. and Energy Transfer Partners $5.3 billion merger.  Mr. Harte currently is part of a team of attorneys asserting the interests of the Brockton and Quincy Retirement Boards against Oppenheimer Global Resource Private Equity Fund I and related Oppenheimer entities.

In his decade of practice prior to joining Block & Leviton, Mr. Harte served as a lead associate in a number of class actions as well as major government investigations.  He worked on the Enron securities litigation, as well as class action lawsuits involving R.J. Reynolds Tobacco, including Schwab v. Phillip Morris et al., No. 04-CV-1945. His government enforcement experience includes representation of a Fortune 100 pharmaceutical company in complex, multi-year federal grand jury investigation into sales and marketing practices.

In addition to class action litigation, Mr. Harte has represented clients in a broad range of matters, including complex commercial litigation and intellectual property litigation.  His antitrust experience included engagements working directly with the FTC to assure compliance under the Hart-Scott-Rodino Act.  He has represented businesses from the start up level through the Fortune 100, and plaintiffs from the individual investor to statewide pension funds.

Mr. Harte received his B.S. from Cornell University and was awarded his J.D. from the University of Pennsylvania Law School, where he was a Senior Editor of the Journal of Constitutional Law.  While at the University of Pennsylvania Law School, he also earned a Certificate of Study in the areas of Business Management and Public Policy from the Wharton School of Business.  Mr. Harte is admitted to the Bars of Massachusetts and New York, along with the U.S. District Courts for the Eastern District of New York and the Southern District of New York.