Overview
Karin Swope is a Partner with Cotchett, Pitre & McCarthy, LLP where she represents clients in antitrust and consumer protection litigation, securities litigation, privacy litigation and intellectual property counseling. Karin has represented clients for over 30 years in proceedings in state and federal courts across the country, as well as before the USPTO. She helped consumers fight against unfair and deceptive practices, and has helped to change consumer protection law in the process. She has been appointed as co-lead counsel and to steering committees in antitrust and consumer cases.
She has extensive experience litigating highly complex antitrust, consumer fraud and other class actions before federal district courts across the country. She has litigated against big tech companies, including serving as lead counsel or on the executive committees in the Apple Device Performance Litigation No. 18-MD-2827 (N.D. Cal.), Google RTB Consumer Privacy Litigation No. 21-CV-02155 (N.D. Cal.) and In re Zoom Video Communications, Inc. Privacy Litigation No. 20-cv-02155 (N.D. Cal). She has prosecuted highly complex actions in Google Play Consumer Antitrust Litigation, No. 20-cv-05761, (N.D. Cal.); In re Bank of America Unemployment Benefits Litigation No. 21-md-2992 (S.D. Cal.), and Yardi Rental Antitrust Litigation, No. 24-CV-063117 (CA Sup. Ct. Alameda Cnty).
She has represented companies and sovereign nations in protecting their intellectual property rights. She has protected the retirement funds of employees whose employers had breached their fiduciary duties in violation of ERISA, in cases against Washington Mutual, State Street Bank and Regions Financial Corporation, among others. She has represented shareholders in complex securities litigation, including disputes involving breach of fiduciary duty. Representative cases include In re Slack Securities Litigation and John Trotter (Ret.), Trustee of the PG&E Fire Victim Trust v. Williams et al.
Since 2008, Karin has served as an Adjunct Professor at Seattle University School of law, where she has taught the Intellectual Property Art Law Clinic. She has previously served as President of Executive Committee of the Intellectual Property Section of the Washington State Bar Association and is a member of the Western Washington Federal Bar Association Local Rules Committee. She has presented and/or co-chaired numerous CLE’s on topics ranging from E-Discovery practices to Intellectual Property. Following her graduation from Columbia Law School, Karin served as a law clerk to the Honorable John C. Coughenour in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington, and as a law clerk to the Honorable Robert E. Cowen of the U.S. Court of Appeals, Third Circuit.
News
News
Honors & Awards
Honors & Recognitions
Selected to Rising Stars and Super Lawyers lists in Super Lawyers - Washington, 2016, 2018-2022
Practice Areas
Education
Amherst College, B.A., magna cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa, 1987
Columbia Law School, J.D., Harlan Fiske Stone Scholar, 1993
Executive Articles Editor, Columbia Human Rights Law Review, Paul Bernstein Scholarship Recipient
Clerkships
- Honorable John C. Coughenour, U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington,
- Honorable Robert E. Cowen, U.S. Court of Appeals, Third Circuit
Admissions
- 1994, Washington
- 1997, U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington
- 1997, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
- 2006, U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California
- 2006, U.S. District Court for the Central District of California
- 2007, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit
- 2009, U.S. District Court for the Western District of Tennessee
- 2010, U.S. Patent and Trademark Office
- 2010, U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida
- 2010, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit
- 2010, U.S. Supreme Court
- 2015, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit
- 2022, U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan