Magistrate Judge Lisa J. Cisneros joined the Court in September 2022, following fifteen years of practice as a litigator and attorney in government and public service. Since her appointment she has presided as a trial, discovery and settlement judge in cases involving areas of law such as employment, copyright, trade secret, trademark, civil rights and insurance. Judge Cisneros currently serves on the Local Rules and Community Education committees of the Court. In addition, she has participated in a variety of panels and presented at the Sedona Conference Working Group on eDiscovery and Electronic Document Management.
Judge Willie J. Epps, Jr. serves as the Chief U.S. Magistrate Judge for the Western District of Missouri and sits in Jefferson City. He began his legal career in service to our country as an Air Force Judge Advocate, Special Assistant U.S. Attorney, and Assistant Special Counsel for the Waco Investigation. Later, he was named partner at two law firms and head of litigation at a financial services firm. Judge Epps is a Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers, member of the Judicial Council of the National Bar Association, and former chair of the ABA National Conference of Federal Trial Judges. He is a graduate of Amherst College, Harvard Law School, and Duke University School of Law.
Judge Young B. Kim is a U.S. Magistrate Judge for the Northern District of Illinois. He was born in South Korea and his family emigrated to the United States when he was 11 years old. He began his legal career as an Assistant Cook County Public Defender in 1991. From 1993 to 1995, he clerked for District Judge Charles R. Norgle of the Northern District of Illinois. From 1995 to 2001, Judge Kim served as an Assistant U.S. Attorney with the Chicago office, prosecuting and litigating both civil and criminal cases. In 2001, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission appointed him to serve as an Administrative Judge. Then in 2010, the District Court for the Northern District of Illinois appointed Judge Kim to a magistrate judge position. As a federal judge he particularly enjoys presiding over citizenship naturalization ceremonies in the ceremonial courtroom where he himself was naturalized as a United States citizen in 1986.
Angel D. Mitchell was appointed in 2019 to serve as a U.S. Magistrate Judge in the District of Kansas. Before joining the bench, she was a partner at Shook Hardy & Bacon, LLP, where she practiced in intellectual property litigation. While there, she represented primarily Fortune 100 clients in patent, trademark, and copyright cases in federal district courts throughout the country. She also handled appellate litigation before the Federal Circuit and coordinated litigation efforts with parallel proceedings before the United States Patent & Trademark Office. Earlier in her career, she practiced as an associate at then-Blackwell Sanders Peper Martin, LLP’s commercial litigation practice, and served as a law clerk to U.S. Magistrate Judge James P. O’Hara and U.S. District Judge John W. Lungstrum.
Born in San Antonio, Texas, he received his bachelor’s degree from Harvard University, a master’s degree from the University of Texas LBJ School of Public Affairs, a Doctor of Jurisprudence degree from the University of Texas Law School, and a Master of Laws in Judicial Studies from Duke University, Bloch Judicial Institute. Prior to assuming the bench, he was a partner in the international law firm of Fulbright & Jaworski (now known as Norton Rose Fulbright). He was board certified in labor and employment law by the Texas Board of Legal Specialization. He served in the U.S. Army Reserve Judge Advocate General’s Corps and has served on the board of directors of several charitable organizations across Texas.
The Honorable Andrew J. Peck served for 23 years (from February 1995 until his retirement in February 2018) as a United States Magistrate Judge for the Southern District of New York, including a term as Chief Magistrate Judge from 2004 to 2005. Before his appointment to the bench, Judge Peck was in private practice for 17 years, focusing on commercial and entertainment litigation, including copyright and trademark matters, with extensive trial experience.
Lea Malani Bays is a partner at Robbins Geller Rudman & Dowd in San Diego. Robbins Geller Rudman & Dowd specializes in complex securities litigation on behalf of investors. Lea currently focuses on the firm’s electronic discovery issues from preservation through production and provides counsel to the firm’s multi-disciplinary e-discovery team. She is familiar with the various stages of electronic discovery, including identification of relevant electronically stored information, data culling, predictive coding protocols, privilege and responsiveness reviews. Lea also has also has experience in post-production discovery through trial preparation for a wide range of litigation.
John Benson has over seventeen years of experience working directly in all technical aspects of eDiscovery and litigation related digital forensics. A SANS Forensics challenge coin holder, he is a founding member of SecKC, and part of the DEF CON Speaker Operations and Photography teams. He is a member of the Missouri Bar Association, the Sedona Conference Working Group on Artifiial Intelligence and is professional photographer.
Zachary Cincotta is an Associate Discovery Counsel with Google LLC in Atlanta, engaged on several international regulatory inquiries and complex litigations. He advises on all facets of the discovery process, including early case investigations and discovery strategy, protective orders and ESI protocols, and discovery motions and disputes. Prior to joining Google, he was in private practice, advising clients in the entertainment industries on intellectual property and contract negotiation. He is a graduate of Northeastern University School of Law (J.D.) and the University of Georgia (B.A.).
For the past 30+ years, Steve Davis has performed and supervised hundreds of investigations on behalf of governmental agencies, corporations, individuals and law firms involving civil and criminal matters. Steve is a Licensed Private Investigator in the State of Texas and the Private Security Company Manager for Purpose Legal. Steve has been with Purpose Legal (and its predecessor company Digital Discovery) for the past 16 years. He has testified on behalf of his clients on over 50 occasions relating to investigative findings on both causation and damages.
Jillian Dent, Partner (Stueve Siegel Hanson). Jillian Dent is a partner at Stueve Siegel Hanson in Kansas City, where she represents individuals in consumer, privacy, and products class-action litigation. She is experienced in e-discovery and has led the e-discovery efforts – both offensive and defensive – in a number of her firm’s data breach, privacy, and dairy products cases. She has negotiated (and argued to courts where disputed) ESI protocols, search terms, and other e-discovery related issues, as well as managed the collection and production of plaintiff-information and the review of defendant-produced information. She works closely with her colleagues and her firm’s e-discovery counsel to leverage new technologies to ensure efficiency without impacting quality of the ultimate discovery produced and received.
Nathaniel is a partner at Hausfeld LLP in Washington, DC, where he focuses on antitrust, consumer, and e-discovery. Nathaniel has litigated complex class actions from inception through trial and has extensive experience negotiating and litigating party and non-party discovery issues.
Daniel is the Advisory Leader of the E-Discovery Managed Services practice group and the creator of BDO's Athenagy™, the only patent pending business intelligence solution in the world that created a Common Data Model and data driven insights fueled by both M365 E5 Compliance Suite’s Microsoft Advanced E-Discovery and RelativityOne.
Daniel has nearly 20 years of experience in the legal space. As a practicing lawyer, he identified that by harnessing new forms of legal technology, both lawyers and legal professionals could be vastly more productive. This realization led him to the legal service provider space and with it, came years of success at consulting with some of the largest corporate law departments and law firms across the country.
Daniel’s experience in e-discovery technical consulting, consultative selling, as well as leading a national operations team for an IT managed services company has enabled him to provide a comprehensive approach to how legal professionals can leverage technology to create a collaborative and dynamic approach to e-discovery. Daniel’s passion for managed services has made him a known thought leader in e- discovery. In addition to being published in several blog posts, articles, and white papers over the years, he is also a frequent CLE speaker.
Lenora has over 15 years of experience in law firm project management and matter support roles, where she has leveraged her organizational skills, research capabilities, and knowledge of analytics and technology. She has broad experience in eDiscovery, data management, and information governance.
As a Data Scientist at Elevate, Lenora works with project teams to understand client business needs and deploy analytics solutions. Her role on the data science team includes designing and carrying out analyses of structured and unstructured data sets, building predictive models for use in technology-assisted review (TAR) workflows, implementing automation solutions, developing custom software, and engaging in collaborative research with the aim to advance understanding and innovation within the field, ultimately contributing to more efficient and effective eDiscovery practices.
Prior to joining Elevate, Lenora was a Data Scientist at Redgrave Data and an Advisor at Redgrave LLP. Earlier in her career, Lenora worked as a Paralegal and Discovery Department Manager at law firms in South Florida. Lenora received her A.S. in Paralegal Studies from Miami Dade College and her B.S. in Computer Science from Florida Atlantic University. She has also received her M.S. in Data Science at the Johns Hopkins University's Whiting School of Engineering as a Fellow of the National GEM Consortium.
Tom is a prominent eDiscovery lawyer and one of the nation's leading authorities on the use of technology-assisted review (TAR) in litigation. Tom advises corporations and law firms on best practices for applying technology to reduce the time and cost of discovery. He has more than 30 years’ experience as a trial lawyer and in-house counsel, most recently with the law firm Schnader Harrison Segal & Lewis, where he was a partner and chair of the eDiscovery Practice Group.
Maura R. Grossman, J.D., Ph.D., is a Research Professor and Director of Women in Computer Science at the University of Waterloo, as well as an Adjunct Professor at Osgoode Hall Law School. She also is Principal at Maura Grossman Law, an eDiscovery law and consulting firm in Buffalo, New York. Previously, Maura was Of Counsel at Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, where, for 17 years, she advised the firm’s lawyers and clients on legal, technical, and strategic issues involving eDiscovery and information governance, both domestically and abroad.
Maura’s scholarly work on TAR, most notably, Technology-Assisted Review in E-Discovery Can Be More Effective and More Efficient Than Exhaustive Manual Review, published in the RICHMOND JOURNAL OF LAW AND TECHNOLOGY in 2011, has been widely cited in the case law, both in the U.S. and elsewhere. Her longstanding contributions to eDiscovery technology and process were featured in the February 2016 issue of THE AMERICAN LAWYER and the September 2016 issue of the ABA JOURNAL, where she was recognized as a “Legal Rebel.” Maura has served as a court-appointed special master, mediator, and eDiscovery expert to the court in many high-profile cases, and has also taught courses in eDiscovery at Columbia, Georgetown, Pace, and Rutgers–Newark law schools. In addition to her J.D. from Georgetown, Maura also holds M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in Psychology from the Derner Institute at Adelphi University.
TJ Hadley, Esq. is a seasoned legal and technology professional with more than 15 years of experience spanning litigation, eDiscovery, and customer success. She currently serves as a Senior Customer Success Manager at Everlaw, advising Am Law 200 firms on technology adoption, workflow optimization, and data security. Prior to Everlaw, TJ practiced litigation and led client services teams in eDiscovery, where she managed complex matters from preservation through production and guided law firms and corporate clients in leveraging advanced analytics. A recognized strategist in AI for legal workflows, she has authored customer success strategies for new product launches and regularly presents on the intersection of law, technology, and client value.
Chance Hodges is Legal Counsel – Privacy and Compliance for O’Reilly Auto Parts. He is responsible for all aspects of O’Reilly’s privacy program, including compliance with evolving state consumer privacy laws, management of consumer and employee data, adoption of data-gathering and processing technologies, and implementation of responsible AI use. Chance split the sixteen years prior to joining O’Reilly between litigation, defending clients in the financial services industry, and in-house counsel for Ameriprise and U.S. Bank, handling transactional matters and advising clients on the intersection of privacy and marketing regulations.
Tessa has practiced law at Husch Blackwell for 29 years where she is a partner and founder/co-chair of the firm’s eDiscovery Solutions group. Tessa has a strong understanding of the legal, technical, and strategic aspects of eDiscovery. She has served as lead eDiscovery counsel in numerous class actions and has led eDiscovery efforts for numerous companies that were the target of investigations by the Department of Justice, Securities and Exchange Commission, and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. Her practice focuses on discovery and related motion practice. She has vast experience with large volume litigation and works in the trenches handling preservation, collection, and managing review teams. Tessa also has tremendous expertise in using data mining tools and technology assisted review. A part of Tessa’s practice also includes working with clients to evaluate and create efficient, repeatable, scalable legal hold processes. Tessa frequently speaks on issues related to eDiscovery and is on the advisory boards for National eDiscovery Leadership Institute and the University of Florida eDiscovery Conference. She was recently appointed to the Sedona Conference Working Group 1 Steering Committee for a three year term. Prior to that, Tessa was the co-Editor-in-Chief of the Sedona Conference, Commentary on Rule 45 Subpoenas to Non-Parties, Second Edition, 22 SEDONA CONF. J. 1 (2020). Tessa is also rated by Chambers and Partners under E-Discovery & Information Governance, USA Guide 2022 and 2023. She is an Adjunct Professor of Law at the University of Missouri at Kansas City School of Law where she teaches a semester long upper level eDiscovery course. Tessa also serves on Husch Blackwell’s Diversity and Inclusion Committee. She founded and runs the Firm’s unique Diversity Liaison Program, a one-on-one mentoring, coaching, and sponsorship program for over 100 plus racially diverse and LGBTQ+ attorneys. Tessa is the inaugural recipient of Relativity’s Innovation Award, Attorney Evangelist Award in 2018. She was also named to Lawyers of Color’s inaugural list of Wonderful Women, 2023.
Trace Johnson is Associate General Counsel and Director of Transactions and Litigation for O’Reilly Auto Parts. Trace and his team handle review of all O’Reilly contractual matters, maintenance of O’Reilly’s intellectual property interests, and oversight of all employment claims, labor matters, ADA Title III claims, and commercial litigation. Prior to joining O’Reilly, Trace practiced with various Springfield firms for 18 years handling transactional matters, business and insurance defense litigation, and employment defense litigation.
Leeanne Mancari is co-chair of the firm's E-Discovery, AI, and Information Governance Practice, and is a Chambers-ranked e-discovery litigator and advisor. She guides clients on all aspects of national and international discovery, and frequently serves as lead e-discovery counsel on large-scale and highly-publicized litigations, including multidistrict and other complex litigations.
Leeanne strategically counsels clients on complex discovery issues to form defensible, efficient, and creative solutions for litigations and investigations. She routinely litigates discovery-related issues and appears in state and federal courts. Leveraging her deep knowledge oncutting edge technology – including AI and machine learning – Leeanne formulates efficient and effective workflows for all phases of datapreservation, collection, review, and production, and has expertise dealing with extraordinary volumes of documents and complex datasources.
Further, Leeanne counsels clients in pre-litigation and non-litigation settings related to information management, including preservation, records management, defensible deletion, risk assessments, and related policies and procedures. Leeanne also advises on international data transfer issues.
Leeanne is a highly regarded global thought leader in the e-discovery arena and has spoken and published extensively. She has held several leadership positions in The Sedona Conference Working Group 6, which focuses on international e-discovery and information governance issues. In her role as Chair of the Steering Committee, Leeanne frequently speaks as a panelist on topics in e-discovery, AI, international electronic information, and disclosure, among others.
Lawyer and experienced e-discovery consultant and a former litigator and trial attorney, specializing in commercial litigation, products liability and warranty litigation, construction litigation, insurance casualty and coverage litigation, and all aspects of e-discovery including data collection, processing, and advanced search and analytics.
After eighteen years in the practice of law, John advises clients on e-discovery strategies, admissibility of electronic evidence, along with best-practices for understanding and reducing data volumes to ultimately lower discovery costs.
John is a member of the EDRM Global Advisory Council, a co-chair on the Seventh Circuit eDiscovery Pilot Program, a member of WG 1 of the Sedona Conference, and President of the ACEDS Chicago Chapter. He has presented at continuing legal education seminars across the Midwest on e-discovery and technology-assisted review topics.
John received a J.D. from the John Marshall Law School and a B.A. from Michigan State University. He is admitted to practice in Illinois.
Robin Perkins is the founder and Chair of Kutak Rock's eDiscovery Practice Group and she maintains an active litigation practice where she regularly appears in state and federal courts across the country. The National eDiscovery Leadership Institute was the brainchild of Ms. Perkins, who sought to create a forum for the scholarly discussion and debate of electronic discovery issues and to foster cooperation among the bench and bar. Ms. Perkins is also an active member of the Sedona Conference Working Group 1, which is the leading "think-tank" on eDiscovery and she serves on the ESI Rules Committee for the United States District Court for the Western District of Missouri. Ms. Perkins regularly counsels clients in all aspects of eDiscovery ranging from data retention to collection, review and production, including outsourcing options, early case assessment and vendor selection. In her capacity as eDiscovery counsel, Ms. Perkins manages projects for clients involving terabytes of data and she has a wealth of experience managing document review projects through the utilization of both onshore and offshore contract attorneys and through the use of cutting edge technologies, such as predictive coding. Ms. Perkins is widely known and respected in the national eDiscovery community as a thought leader through her numerous articles, alerts and speaking engagements on the all aspects of eDiscovery. Ms. Perkins’s greatest asset to clients, however, is her common sense approach to eDiscovery matters, which is derived from her thriving commercial litigation practice encompassing the financial services, life sciences and technology industries, including defense of product liability matters, ADA and TCPA litigation. In her own practice, Ms. Perkins "walks the walk" by implementing the very eDiscovery approaches about which she speaks and writes.
Amy Ambroson Reid is the Director of Litigation Solutions & GTM at UnitedLex focusing on strategic solutions that solve client legal challenges and bringing new solutions to market. With 16 years of experience in eDiscovery, Amy has expertise across the litigation lifecycle.
Specializing in creating customized centers of excellence for both corporate and law firm clients, Amy has led and coordinated processes from start to finish including ECA, protocol consulting, AI and analytics, surprising review teams, conducting focus groups, and ensuring quality of the finished product. Experienced on cases across a variety of industries including pharmaceutical, criminal, banking, real estate, insurance, trademark infringement, and environmental law, Amy is passionate about bringing efficiency and measurable value to her clients.
Amy received a J.D. from The University of Iowa College of Law and a B.B.A. in Management & Marketing from The University of Iowa. She is admitted to practice in Kansas and Missouri.
Moira Sweazey is in-house discovery counsel at Capital One. She leads the company’s Legal Hold Program and manages litigation matters as part of Capital One’s Litigation Discovery team. Her team manages Capital One’s in-house preservation, collection, processing, review, and production processes.Moira advises on the entire discovery process including early case investigations, protective orders and ESI protocols. Prior to joining Capital One, Moira worked in Big Law and at legal service providers, with a focus on eDiscovery and corporate litigation, serving Fortune 500 clients across multiple industries.
Sean Wiederkehr is an expert ediscovery practitioner with a record of success helping clients give and get the discovery they need. His current role on Everlaw's Solution Architect team assists law firms and corporations in validating their technical requirements and highlighting the value that our platform can bring to their organizations.
Sean has 18 years of experience in the ediscovery space and has worked for both boutique litigation shops and AmLaw 50 firms. He has experience at every stage of the EDRM cycle and has worked on matters covering a broad spectrum of practice area including regulatory investigations, complex litigation, and other disputes.
Sean holds a BA from UCLA. He lives in New York where he hosts a weekly pub trivia night and plays music in a band.
