Career Milestones

• Daily Record Leadership in Law Award, 2006
• Maryland Trial Lawyer of the Year, 2000
• National Law Journal "Top Wins of the Year," 2000
• Maryland "Super Lawyer," 2007-Present

Profile

Andy Freeman obtains justice for his clients. He has won numerous verdicts, judgments, and settlements of millions and tens of millions of dollars by mastering the relevant law and getting to know his clients, their problems, and the evidence in their cases.

Other lawyers bring Andy cases that present complicated combinations of law and facts or that require making new law. After finding witnesses the defendant had failed to disclose, Andy won $7 million at trial for a mother whose toddler had been killed by a pit bull; and he collected all of it after convincing Maryland's highest court that a landlord with knowledge and control of a tenant's dangerous pet should be held responsible for the pet's attacks on visitors. After a California lawyer told University of California students that they could not challenge tuition increases, Andy won them over $40 million. He convinced a federal court that Maryland's tax sale laws requiring notice to landlords and their lenders - but not their tenants - violated the tenants' rights, and won a substantial verdict for two wrongly evicted tenants.

Juries trust Andy. When he asked a jury to fully compensate an African-American school superintendent whose contract had not been renewed because of his race, the jury awarded every penny he was owed (over $500,000, plus fees) and recommended that a school be named in his honor.

Judges respect Andy. One federal judge appointed him to represent prisoners in a collective action over second-hand tobacco smoke (a case that resulted in compensation for the clients and the banning of tobacco from Maryland's prisons), and another asked him to serve on the U.S. District Court's task force regarding electronic discovery.

His peers chose Andy as the Maryland Trial Lawyer of the Year.

Practice Areas

Appeals, Business Disputes, Child Sexual Abuse, Civil Litigation, Civil Rights, Class Actions, Employment Law, Fair Housing, Personal Injury/Wrongful Death, Premises Liability, Products Liability, Professional Malpractice, Public Interest Litigation, Randolph-Sheppard Act

Education

• Stanford Law School, J.D. with distinction, Symposium Editor of Stanford Law Review, 1986
• Harvard University, B.A. magna cum laude, class marshal, 1981

Clerkship

• Law Clerk to Judge Norman P. Ramsey, United States District Court for the District of Maryland, 1986-87

Representative Cases

• J.D. v. A.P., Inc. - obtained $300,000 settlement for woman sexually harassed by her supervisor (2010).
• Kashmiri v. Regents of the University of California - won $42 million in a class action on behalf of University of California students for tuition overcharges; judgment affirmed on appeal at 156 Cal. App. 4th 809 (2007).
• HD Joint Venture v. Eggspectation USA, LLC - represented group of investors in obtaining the return, with interest and attorneys' fees, of their $1 million investment in a start-up company (2007).
• Ford v. Baltimore City Department of Social Services - obtained settlement of over $2 million for child seriously injured in foster care (2007).
• Cochran v. PHI - obtained settlement of $825,000 for choking death of intellectually disabled resident of group home (2007).
• Thompson v. HUD - won award of $1.5 million in fees for plaintiffs' attorneys for their enforcement of partial consent decree desegregating Baltimore's public housing, 2001 WL 1636517 (D. Md. 2001). Co-lead counsel since 2002 in enforcing the partial consent decree. Co-lead counsel for remedies phase of trial, 2006.
• Wenzel v. Brooke - won verdict of $15 million on behalf of victim of child sexual abuse (2004).
• NISH v. Cohen and NISH v. Rumsfeld - lead counsel for blind vendors in cases that established that Randolph-Sheppard Act applies to military mess halls, 247 F.3d 197 (4th Cir. 2001), 348 F.3d 1263 (10th Cir. 2003).
• In re Creditrust Corp. Securities Litigation - obtained dismissal of outside directors from suit for alleged securities fraud that ultimately settled for $7.5 million as to other defendants (2002).
• Halliday v. Sturm, Ruger & Co. - represented the plaintiff in the first case in the country filed against a handgun manufacturer for its failure to childproof its guns, 368 Md. 186, 792 A.2d 1145 (2002).
• Tozzi v. Advanced Medical Management - obtained settlements totaling over $200,000 for woman wrongfully fired following bilateral mastectomies (2002).
• Foltz v. Doe - won $1 million verdict in a counter-suit on behalf of a girl who was sexually abused by a lawyer, after the lawyer-abuser sued for defamation, a result that was recognized by the National Law Journal as one of the "Top Defense Wins of 2000."
• McIntyre v. Robinson - appointed by federal court to represent prisoners injured by second-hand tobacco smoke in case that resulted in ban on cigarettes and other tobacco products in Maryland state prisons, 126 F. Supp. 2d 394 (D. Md. 2000).
• Matthews v. Amberwood Associates - won $7 million verdict in a case in which Maryland's highest court established new law regarding a landlord's responsibility to protect visitors from known dangerous animals, 351 Md. 544, 719 A.2d 119 (1998).
• Sallie v. Tax Sale Investors, Inc. - won verdict of over $200,000 on behalf of tenants evicted without notice following a tax sale of the home they rented; the case resulted in a new law requiring notification of tenants before tax sales and before eviction, 998 F. Supp. 612 (D. Md. 1998).
• Baltimore Neighborhoods, Inc. v. Leonard Stulman Enterprises, L.P. - obtained a $900,000 settlement of a housing discrimination case in which a garden apartment development steered African-American tenants to rear units (1997).
• Minnesota v. Riley - counsel for blind vendor in first case to apply the Randolph-Sheppard Act to the Department of Veterans Affairs, 107 F.3d 648 (8th Cir. 1997).
• Whittington v. Somerset County Board of Education - won verdict of over $800,000 and the renaming of a school in honor of the plaintiff, a former superintendent of schools in an employment discrimination case (1996).
• Fenwick-Schaefer v. Winchester Homes, Inc. - won $2 million verdict for discriminatory advertising, a result that was recognized by the Washington Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights with its "Outstanding Achievement Award in the Field of Fair Housing" for 1994.

Awards

• Maryland Super Lawyer 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010.
• Robert M. Bell Award for Leadership in Public Service from the University of Baltimore Students for Public Interest, 2010.
• Champion of Justice Award of The Legal Aid Bureau, 2009.
• Leadership in Law Award 2006, the Daily Record.
• Top Defense Wins of 2000, the National Law Journal.
• Maryland Trial Lawyer of the Year, 2000.
• Huntington S. Williams Award of the Coalition to End Childhood Lead Poisoning, 1998.
• "Outstanding Achievement Award in the Field of Fair Housing" from the Washington Lawyer's Committee for Civil Rights and Urban Affairs, 1994.
• Sampson Green Award of the Maryland Food Committee for "outstanding efforts to bring the National School Breakfast Program to Baltimore County," 1992.
• "Most Energetic Foster Parent" Award of the Baltimore City Department of Social Services, 1990.

Activities

• Family League of Baltimore City (Local Management Board that coordinates services for City's children and families) board president 2000-present.
• Lawyers' Round Table law club member 2001-present.
• Safe and Sound: Baltimore's Campaign for Children, Youth and Families, board member, 2002-present.
• Legal Aid Bureau Equal Justice Council member 2006-present.
• American Civil Liberties Union of Maryland Committee on Litigation and Legal Priorities 2007-present.
• Wasserstein Fellow, Harvard Law School, 2006-07 (sponsored by Office of Public Interest Advising).
• Beilenson for Congress Treasurer 2005-06.
• Robert Wood Johnson Urban Health Initiative Fellow 2001-05.
• Foster Parent, Baltimore City Department of Social Services 1988-93; vice president, Foster Parents Association of Baltimore, 1990-91.
• The Family Tree (formerly Child Abuse Prevention Center of Maryland) board president 1996-97, 1998-99, board member 1991-2000.
• Coalition to End Childhood Lead Poisoning board president 1994-96, board member 1993-96.
• Court Appointed Special Advocates (CASA) of Baltimore volunteer 1989-93; CASA Recognition Awards 1990, 1991, 1993.
• Maryland Friends of Foster Children board member 1993-96, board secretary 1994-96.
• The Leadership program of the Greater Baltimore Committee, 1995.

Publications

• "No-fault Birth-related Neurologic Injury Compensation: Perhaps Its Time Has Come Again," Harvard Risk Management Foundation Forum, Feb. 2003 (coauthor)
• "Grassroots Impact Litigation: Mass Filing of Small Claims," University of San Francisco Law Review, Winter 1992 (coauthor)
• "No-Fault Cerebral Palsy Insurance: An Alternative to the Obstetrical Malpractice Lottery," Journal of Health Politics, Policy and Law, Winter 1989 (coauthor)
• "A Critique of Economic Consistency," Stanford Law Review, May 1987
• "The Effect of Tennis on History," USAir Magazine, May 1985