Kaye Scholer's Lori Leskin and Aaron Levine Win 2014 Burton Award for Distinguished Legal Writing

NEW YORK: Kaye Scholer Partner Lori Leskin and Associate Aaron Levine have received a 2014 Burton Award for Distinguished Legal Writing for their article “Avoiding Food Fraud,” published by Food Manufacturing. Only 30 winners are chosen annually from nominations submitted by the nation’s top 1,000 largest and most prestigious law firms for a bylined article published in a credible media outlet in the previous year.

In their article, Leskin and Levine detail the different types of economically motivated adulteration of food products that constitute food fraud. They describe the various ways that consumer advocacy groups and the Food and Drug Administration have attempted to protect and educate food consumers and the industry about the potential for food fraud, and also provide advice for food manufacturers on how to address this growing issue.

Leskin serves as Co-Leader of the firm’s Product Liability Litigation Practice and Leader of its Food, Beverage & Supplements team, and recently completed a term as Co-Head of the Products Liability Committee of the American Bar Association’s Section of Litigation. She handles all aspects of litigation strategy for complex nationwide and multidistrict litigations involving a variety of products, including serving as national counsel to Pfizer Inc. in its Hormone Therapy and Viagra® product liability litigations, and serving as national counsel for Novartis Consumer Health, Inc. in the phenylpropanolamine product liability cases.

Levine focuses his practice on pharmaceutical product liability litigation. He has represented major pharmaceutical clients in all phases of the litigation process, including motion practice, discovery, expert workup, trial preparation and trial, and endgame settlement analysis, and has also acted as a key member of national coordinating counsel for a major pharmaceutical company in mass-tort multidistrict litigation.

The Burton Awards for Legal Achievement, held in association with the Library of Congress, were established in 1999 to reward great achievements in law, including publications and reforms, in addition to legal writing. According to a website statement by the Awards’ founder, William C. Burton, “We hope to continue to be a central and pivotal voice against convoluted and stilted writing.”

Leskin and Levine will be honored, along with the other 2014 Award recipients, on Monday, June 9, 2014 at the Library of Congress in Washington, DC. This year, Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens will be presented with the “Book of the Year in Law Award.”