William E. Braff

Billy practices in Taft’s litigation group, where he handles cases in all stages of the litigation lifecycle. Before joining Taft, he served as a law clerk for the Hon. Douglas R. Cole on the United States District Court for the Southern District of Ohio, and prior to that, for the Hon. John B. Nalbandian on the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit.

As a law student, Billy participated in the United States Department of Justice’s Summer Law Intern Program (“SLIP”) with the Commercial Litigation Branch and clerked for the Ohio Senate. He also worked for a bipartisan lobbying group in Washington, D.C. prior to enrolling in law school. Drawing on his experience in the public sector, Billy understands how to navigate the precarious waters of regulation, enforcement, and litigation at both the state and federal level.

Billy graduated summa cum laude from The Ohio State University Moritz College of Law. There, he earned the Earnest Karam Award for Legal Writing, along with 11 CALI Awards, each representing the top grade in a given class, including Civil Procedure, Contracts, Criminal Law, Constitutional Law, Securities, and Election Law. He served as Executive Articles Editor for The Ohio State Law Journal and represented Ohio State in the Frank A. Schreck Gaming Law Moot Court Competition. Billy received his B.A. from Kenyon College with distinction in English and Political Science.

“Putting Learned Treatises Under the Microscope: Assessing the Rule 803(18) Hearsay Exception and the Reproducibility Crisis in Social Science,” Review of Litigation, The Brief, Vol. 39, Fall 2019.