With two decades of experience prosecuting complex litigation in federal courts, Jim Harrod’s practice focuses on representing the firm’s institutional investor clients in securities fraud-related matters. He also leads the firm’s Global Securities and Litigation Monitoring Team, which monitors securities class and group actions around the world, and advises BLB&G’s institutional clients on potential avenues for recovery in those actions.
Over the course of his career, he has obtained over $3 billion on behalf of investor classes. Most recently, he played a key role on the BLB&G team that recovered over $2 billion for 35 institutions that invested in the Allianz Structured Alpha Funds. Jim's other high-profile cases include In re Motorola Securities Litigation, in which he was a key member of the team that represented the State of New Jersey’s Division of Investment and obtained a $190 million recovery three days before trial. Recently, Jim represented the class of investors in the securities litigation against General Motors arising from GM’s recall of vehicles with defective ignition switches, and recovered $300 million for investors – the second largest securities class action recovery in the Sixth Circuit.
Jim represented institutional investors in several cases concerning the issuance of residential mortgage-backed securities prior to the financial crisis. He worked on the team that recovered $500 million for investors in In re Bear Stearns Mortgage Pass-Through Certificates Litigation, which brought claims related to the issuance of mortgage pass-through certificates during 2006 and 2007. In a similar action, Plumbers’ & Pipefitters’ Local #562 Supplemental Plan & Trust v. J.P. Morgan Acceptance Corp. I, he recovered $280 million on behalf of a class of investors. Other mortgage-backed securities cases that Jim worked on include In re Lehman Bros. Mortgage-Backed Securities Litigation ($40 million recovery), and Tsereteli v. Residential Asset Securitization Trust 2006-A8 ($10.9 million recovery).
Jim has been active in prosecuting claims against foreign issuers and actions brought under foreign law, including the Israeli securities law claims currently being prosecuted in the Perrigo securities litigation. He served as lead counsel in a class action led by Union Asset Management AG—a large German asset manager—in litigation against Equifax related to its 2017 data breach. He also served as lead counsel in litigation on behalf of investors in Volkswagen AG American Depository Receipts (ADRs), relating to the automaker’s alleged misrepresentations concerning its “clean diesel” cars, which claims involved significant international discovery, foreign jurisdictional issues and overlapping litigation in Europe.
Among his other notable recoveries are The Department of the Treasury of the State of New Jersey and its Division of Investment v. Cliffs Natural Resources Inc. (class recovery of $84 million); Anwar, et al., v. Fairfield Greenwich Limited (settlement valued at $80 million); In re Service Corporation International ($65 million recovery); Danis v. USN Communications, Inc. ($44.6 million recovery); In re Tower Group International, Ltd. Securities Litigation ($20.5 million recovery); In re Navistar International Securities Litigation ($13 million recovery); and In re Sonus Networks, Inc. Securities Litigation-II ($9.5 million recovery).
In connection with his representation of institutional investors, he is a frequent speaker to public pension fund organizations and trustees concerning fiduciary duties, emerging issues in securities litigation and the financial markets.
Jim is recognized as a "Litigation Star" by Benchmark Litigation, and is regularly named to lists of leading practitioners by Lawdragon, and Thomson Reuters' Super Lawyers for his professional achievements. More recently, he was named a Plaintiffs’ Lawyers Trailblazers by The National Law Journal.