Katherine M. Poldneff

Kathy is an experienced litigator who focuses her practice on complex commercial litigation, non-compete and trade secret litigation, and professional liability matters. Her wide-ranging experience spans cases involving a variety of complex commercial contract disputes, trade secrets and non-compete agreements, professional liability disputes, high-stakes arbitration and mediation, and appeals across a variety of industries, including financial services, legal services, and telecommunications. She has also handled significant injunction litigation and various employment discrimination matters at both the administrative and litigation stages.

Experience prior to joining Taft:

• Represented a private equity firm in a high-stakes international arbitration before the ICDR, in which the team successfully secured five highly favorable arbitration awards, including an award for over $300 million in damages, all of which were subsequently converted to judgments of the Southern District of New York. Successfully defended against multiple attempts to overturn such judgments in the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.
• Successfully petitioned the tribunal in the ICDR for early and expedited specific-performance relief ordering the sale of the parties’ joint venture pursuant to the terms of the shareholders’ agreement, which Judge Lewis A. Kaplan in the Southern District of New York affirmed. Telecom Business Solution, LLC v. Terra Towers Corp., 22-cv-1761 (LAK), 2023 WL 257915 (S.D. N.Y. Jan. 18, 2023).
• Represented nationally recognized banking institution in multiple non-competition and trade secret litigations involving former employees and successfully settled such disputes.
• Secured dismissal of contract and quasi-contract claims against an international beverage distributor on a motion to dismiss.
• Part of the litigation team that successfully arbitrated and settled a bet-the-company complex commercial contract dispute involving the construction of a large, mixed-use real estate project.
• Part of the litigation team that successfully settled complex contract disputes involving breach of fiduciary duty claims between and among the principals of a partnership and a limited liability company.
• Part of the litigation team that successfully obtained a preliminary injunction on behalf of a law firm and then settled trade secret and breach of fiduciary duty matter where attorney departed from the firm and improperly solicited clients.
• Part of the litigation team that filed injunction litigation and then successfully settled a trade secret and non-competition dispute involving an employee who left a manufacturing company to work with a competitor.
• Part of the litigation team that obtained preliminary injunctive relief on behalf of large, nationally recognized bank in connection with a fraudulent kiting scheme.
• Managed litigation team that defended and successfully settled professional liability litigation against nationally recognized law firm.
• Part of the litigation team that defended and successfully settled complex contract dispute involving claims of fraudulent inducement related to a Membership Interest Purchase Agreement and the calculation of EBITDA for an agreed earn-out period.
• Part of the litigation team that successfully prosecuted and settled an action based on fraud, conversion, and breach of contract on behalf of a real estate development company specializing in FHA-insured, multifamily real estate projects.