Fryer & Ross LLP was founded in October 1985 by Hugh Fryer, formerly partner of Dewey Ballantine, and Gerald Ross, a former Dewey Ballantine Associate who has been in private practice since March 1981. Hugh Fryer retired on December 31, 2001 after 35 years at the bar.
Gerald Ross has developed expertise in the representation of attorneys with respect to their relationship with present and former partners and has represented a number of attorneys in disputes with their former partners and in the defense of misconduct complaints lodged with the First Department Disciplinary Committee. Ross has served the Appellate Division as a receiver of disbarred attorney's files and has assisted the court in reviewing applicants to the First Department bench. Ross has also successfully represented federal and state criminal defendants and subjects of criminal investigations.
The firm has made law in several of its litigations, including on of the first "look and feel" computer software copyright infringement litigations, successfully representing corporate policy holders in insurance coverage litigation and testing the limits of the 1995 amendments to the Securities Exchange Act. We have also been successful in representing defendants in complex product liability matters, in the representation of debtors and creditors in the bankruptcy courts, in complex securities fraud and RICO litigation, in conducting statutory accountings of partnership interests.
In addition to litigating complex and novel issues, both partners of the firm have served as arbitrators, Ross on several American Arbitration Association construction arbitration panels and Fryer on NASD securities arbitration matters. Ross is a member of the Association of the Bar panel of arbitrators available for resolution of disputes between attorneys. Ross has served on three committees of the Association of the Bar of the City of New York concerned with professional ethics and discipline. Ross is also secretary of the New York State Bar Association Special Committee on Procedures for Judicial Discipline.