Theodore M. Becker

Partner

Theodore M. Becker is a partner in Morgan Lewis's Litigation Practice and is a member of the ERISA Litigation and Labor and Employment Practices. Mr. Becker is also a member of the firm's Class Action Cross-Discipline Team. He has a national practice with more than 25 years of experience in litigation, including class action defense and dispute resolution

Mr. Becker represents clients along the entire litigation continuum, from litigation avoidance and prelitigation planning, through dispositive motions, discovery, trial and appeal. He practices before the U.S. Supreme Court; federal and state trial and appeals courts; and bankruptcy courts, as well as before administrative and regulatory agencies and in arbitration, mediation, and alternative dispute resolution proceedings.

Mr. Becker has obtained a number of multimillion-dollar recoveries for his clients and has successfully defended many clients against multimillion-dollar claims. He achieved national recognition when he obtained a $52 million jury verdict for a breach of a "handshake" agreement.

Mr. Becker has represented clients in a wide variety of legal areas and industries, including business, commercial, contract and corporate disputes, civil rights, consumer law, e-commerce, employment, employee benefits, ERISA, ESOPs, false advertising, financial services, franchising, hospitality, healthcare, intellectual property, real estate, retailers, RICO, securities, trademark infringement, unfair competition, and workouts. He has successfully represented clients ranging from individuals and small companies to major financial institutions and the largest multinationals.

Mr. Becker has experience in ERISA litigation and defense of regulatory agency investigations and actions relating to employee benefits and retirement plans. In such matters, he has represented companies and their directors and officers, and ERISA plan fiduciaries. Mr. Becker has special experience with Employee Stock Ownership Plans (ESOPs) and has handled some of the highest profile lawsuits involving such plans. He has also defended healthcare companies and insurers in actions under ERISA and other federal and state laws, including claims for improper plan termination, denial of benefits, breach of contract, securities fraud, and unfair competition. 

Over the years, Mr. Becker has defended companies and their directors and officers in litigation involving claims of breach of fiduciary duty, noncompetition covenants, and misappropriation of customer lists, trade secrets, and confidential and proprietary information, including actions for injunctions.

For many years, Mr. Becker has represented national and international franchisors in a wide variety of industries, including the hotel, food, restaurant, automobile, and tool industries in litigation across the full spectrum of disputes and issues arising in the course of relationships with franchisees, distributors, and dealers. These matters have included claims of breaches of franchise agreements; franchise terminations, transfers, and renewals; violations of franchise disclosure, relationship, and business opportunity laws; antitrust and unfair competition claims; trademark, trade dress and trade secret infringement; violation of non-competition and non-solicitation covenants; and real estate construction and financing disputes.

Mr. Becker is included in the Martindale-Hubbell Bar Register of Preeminent Lawyers and is rated "AV" (the highest rating) by the Martindale-Hubbell Law Directory. He is a member of the Morgan Lewis ERISA Litigation group that was listed in the highest tier for National ERISA Litigation in the 2010 Chambers USA: America's Leading Lawyers for Business. He also is recognized for his practice in commercial litigation and civil appellate law in the 2011 edition of Leading Lawyers: The Top Business Lawyers in Illinois.

Mr. Becker consistently has been recognized for his pro bono service, and in 2011 received an award for his successful representation of a nonprofit educational organization, resulting in a $3 million finding against a disbarred attorney who breached his duty as the executor of an estate by diverting assets willed to the organization.

Mr. Becker serves on the Legislative and Regulatory Advisory Committee of The ESOP Association, and has published numerous articles and regularly speaks on legal issues of concern to the ESOP community. In March 2011, he presented at a conference of the Illinois Chapter of The ESOP Association on "Surviving Regulatory Inquiries."  He co-authored a chapter of The ESOP Association Fiduciary Committee's 2010 handbook, as well as an October 2010 article on "Insuring ESOP Fiduciaries" in the ESOP Report, the newsletter of The ESOP Association. Mr. Becker also spoke on "Fiduciary Indemnification and Insurance" at the November 2010 Conference of The ESOP Association and co-authored "The Larue Holding's Impact on ESOPs" in the June/July 2008 issue of ESOP Report Magazine. 

Mr. Becker was a Russell Sage Fellow at Yale University Law School, where he taught, and a Fellow of the Northwestern University Program in Law and the Social Sciences. He was editorial director of an entire issue of the Northwestern University Law Review that was reprinted as a book (Public Access to Information, Transaction Press).

Mr. Becker is admitted to practice in Illinois and before the U.S. Supreme Court; the U.S. Courts of Appeals for the Sixth, Seventh, Ninth, Tenth, and Federal Circuits; and various U.S. district courts.