William Roberts
Partner
Rob Roberts is a versatile commercial litigator who focuses his practice primarily on the areas of restructuring and health care. Drawing on more than a decade of experience, he handles contested Chapter 11 bankruptcy cases, commercial disputes and False Claims Act litigation for health care and life sciences companies, and commercial disputes, fiduciary duty litigation and pre-investment diligence involving private equity and venture capital firms and their portfolio companies.
Rob enjoys the challenge and the opportunity of working with clients to help them through difficult situations and times of crisis, including restructurings, broken deals and high-stakes litigation. In such charged situations, his broad experience, sound judgment and calmness under pressure are valuable assets to clients.
In addition to his busy litigation practice, Rob devotes a significant amount of time to pro bono work. Among other efforts, he has been extremely involved in Ropes & Gray’s medical-legal partnership with Dorchester House in Boston, and currently serves as co-lead of the program.
Experience
Health Care Litigation
- Successfully represented a national pharmacy in a Massachusetts Attorney General investigation into prescription drug pricing.
- Representing hospitals, academic medical centers, and pharmaceutical companies in complex commercial disputes and False Claims Act litigation.
- Represented major pharmaceutical companies in False Claims Act litigation involving the offering of free nursing and reimbursement support services and successfully obtained dismissal of all claims.
- Represented Boston Children’s Hospital in defeating a challenge to a determination of need, brought by opponents of a much needed modernization and expansion project to build, among other things, a state-of-the-art NICU and heart center.
Investment Funds
- Regularly represent private investment fund managers in responding to SEC and third party subpoenas.
- Represented leading private equity firm in COVID-related broken deal litigation in Delaware Chancery Court.
- Successfully moved to dismiss a private equity company from putative federal class action lawsuits related to the closure of a subsidiary of one of its portfolio companies, a for-profit law school.
- Representing private equity firms and their portfolio companies in complex commercial disputes, broken deal litigation, and pre-acquisition diligence.
- Advising leading venture capital firms on Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and anti-corruption compliance.
Restructuring Litigation
- Representing Elliott Investment Management in the contested Chapter 11 restructuring of Windstream Holdings.
- Conducted investigation of potential related-party claims on behalf of the Special Committee of a Chapter 11 debtor.
- Represented 1.5 lien indenture trustee for $250 million of notes issued by Momentive Performance Materials following remand by the Second Circuit in precedent-setting litigation on the determination of cramdown interest rates in Chapter 11 bankruptcy.
- Represented the official committee of unsecured creditors in the Chapter 11 case of Sabine Oil & Gas.
- Represented a hedge fund creditor in derivatives claims litigation in Lehman bankruptcy.
- Represented the Indenture Trustee for the First Lien Noteholders in the Chapter 11 restructuring of Energy Future Intermediate Holdings LLC.
- Defending the directors of insolvent companies in fiduciary duty litigation.
- Lead trial counsel in successful Chapter 11 reorganization of a historic African Methodist Episcopal Church.
Pro Bono
- Assisting the Special Master appointed by the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court in litigation related to addressing COVID-19 issues in state and counties prisons and jails.
- Co-supervising partner for the firm’s Medical Legal Partnership project, which has provided pro bono legal services to hundreds of Dorchester House patients.
Publications
- Featured, “They’ve Got Next: Healthcare and Life Sciences Fresh Face Rob Roberts,” Bloomberg Law (April 22, 2021)
- Featured, “Making Partner in a Pandemic,” Bloomberg Law (April 12, 2021)
Education
- JD, Harvard Law School, 2010; Journal of Sports and Entertainment Law
- AB (Economics), Princeton University, 2005
Admissions / Qualifications
Qualifications
- Massachusetts, 2010
Court Admissions
- U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, 2021
- U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts, 2016
- U.S. Court of Federal Claims, 2011
Awards
- Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly “Excellence in the Law” (2021)
- Bloomberg Law “They’ve Got Next: Healthcare and Life Sciences” (2021)