Subodh Chandra

Subodh (rhymes with “abode”) Chandra (rhymes with “tundra”) is the founding and managing partner of The Chandra Law Firm LLC. Chandra’s practice focuses on high-profile civil and appellate litigation, including civil-rights, employment, and business litigation; and on internal investigations and white-collar-criminal law, in both federal and state courts. The litigation that Chandra handles often has a crisis-communications, public-policy dimension.

Before founding the firm, Chandra served as Director of Law of the City of Cleveland, a billion-dollar corporation. Chandra led the work of an 82-lawyer department with both criminal and civil divisions. He also sometimes served as the City’s acting mayor. As Cleveland’s general counsel, Chandra handled legal work in-house and slashed by nearly 90% spending on outside counsel, saving millions; moved vigorously through in-house investigations to clean up internal corruption; restored the department’s reputation; and attracted top performers who helped make it Ohio’s most diverse law firm.

Previously, as a federal prosecutor, Chandra successfully prosecuted health-care fraud and corruption—winning special recognition from FBI director Robert Mueller.

Before that, Chandra served as a litigator in large firms in both Cleveland and Los Angeles, and served as special presidential counsel at the American Bar Association.

Chandra is a graduate of the Yale Law School, where he was executive editor of the Yale Law & Policy Review. He also graduated with honors and distinction from Stanford University, which awarded him the John Gardner Fellowship to work with Ohio Governor Dick Celeste.

Chandra has served as Distinguished Practitioner in Residence at Case Western Reserve University School of Law, teaching appellate practice and legal ethics.

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• Contingent Fees
  Many civil-rights, discrimination, sexual-harassment, whistleblower, and retaliation matters are subject to agreements in which we recover fees upon success. White-collar-criminal-defense matters are based on hourly or structured flat-fee agreements.

California

Since 1997

New Mexico

Since 1995

Ohio

Since 1998

Managing Partner

The Chandra Law Firm LLC

2005 - Current

Practice includes high-profile and complex civil-rights, constitutional, voting rights, employment, and business civil trial-and-appellate litigation; white-collar-criminal defense; professional ethics and licensing; and internal investigations. Successfully defended healthcare, mortgage-fraud, telecommunications-fraud, and telemarketing-fraud allegations. Multimillion-dollar trial verdicts and settlements. Emphasis on client crisis-communications strategies in matters of public interest.

Director of Law

City of Cleveland, Ohio

2002 - 2005

Served as general counsel of billion-dollar-plus corporation and sometimes as acting mayor. Led turnaround of 85-lawyer law firm with civil and criminal divisions. Counseled mayor; various departments (including nation’s 10th largest public-water utility, largest state public-electric utility, and international airport); and city-council members. Conducted numerous internal-fraud, public corruption, and ethics investigations, resulting in large recoveries to city coffers. Hands-on litigation, prosecutorial, legislative, and transactional work, including civil-rights, employment, and First-Amendment disputes, criminal-charging decisions in police use-of-deadly-force cases, environmental defense of airport expansion, and economic-development projects. Creatively settled Innocence Project’s wrongful-conviction case, Green v. City of Cleveland, now invoked as national model, and Justice Department civil-rights investigations into police use of deadly force and jail conditions. Raised charging standards in criminal division. Served on team preparing City’s homeland-security readiness. Edited all case-dispositive motions and appellate briefs. Developed ethics protocol and served as chief ethics officer. Recruited staff from top firms and corporations, improved morale, and reduced voluntary turnover by two thirds over two years. Slashed outside-counsel spending by 90%. Increased proportion of minority lawyers from 23% to 34% at line, and from 20% to 31% at management levels; raised percentage of criminal-division minority lawyers from zero to a majority.

Assistant United States Attorney

U.S. Department of Justice

1999 - 2002

Prosecuted complex federal economic crimes at trial and appellate levels. Coordinated and oversaw complex, multiple-target investigations with federal and state interagency task force. Prosecuted criminal healthcare fraud and corruption, money laundering, and mail, wire, and bank-fraud schemes. Advocacy, negotiations, and trials resulted in conviction of numerous criminal defendants, and in leading appellate opinions. Special commendations for “demonstrated excellence” from FBI Director Robert Mueller; Cleveland FBI Special Agent in Charge Mark Bullock.

Associate

Thompson Hine

1997 - 1999

Litigated trade-secret, contract, and employment cases in federal and state courts. Recruited clients to firm. Pro bono racial-profiling case.

Associate

Christensen, Miller, Fink, Jacobs, Glaser, Weil & Shapiro

1996 - 1997

Represented entertainment-industry, elected-official, and police-department clients, including motion-picture studios, Los Angeles mayor, city-council members, and Beverly Hills police department, in complex business disputes, libel defense, and misconduct cases.

Special Presidential Counsel

American Bar Association

1994 - 1995

Developed reform initiatives for leader of world’s largest professional organization in civil- and criminal-justice reform, domestic violence, legal-aid preservation, ethics, and human rights.

Yale Law School

J.D. (1994) | Law

1991 - 1994

Stanford University

B.A. (1989) | Political Science and Sociology

1985 - 1989

Honors: Graduated with honors, and distinction in two departments; elected to Phi Beta Kappa, junior year.

State Bar of Ohio  # 0069233

Member

Current