ABOUT

Jeff Patterson is a partner in the Dallas office of Hartline, Dacus, Barger, Dreyer & Kern, LLP, and joined the original partners in the founding of the firm. He has served a number of domestic and international manufacturing concerns in various types of litigation, including class actions, dealer termination litigation, product liability, manufacturer-supplier, commercial litigation, and more recently, intellectual property litigation. These conflicts have required him to gain expertise in systems and technologies too numerous to list. Mr. Patterson began his career participating in a major investigation for an auto manufacturer in order to prepare its defense for anticipated pattern litigation. Since then, he has served in a first chair capacity in numerous trials in Texas and Arkansas, and has managed cases in numerous other states. He grew up in East Texas and Southwest Arkansas, and has ties to a number of courts in East Texas.

He served as Associate Liaison at HDBDK for its first seven years, training and evaluating its first generations of associates. He continues to teach in-house and external CLE courses, specializing in the art of voir dire, the preparation of foreign and domestic corporate representatives and the ethics and efficiencies of time keeping.

CASE EXPERIENCE

• Successfully obtained a defense verdict in a 2006 case on behalf of a forklift manufacturer defending against claims of fraud, breach of warranty and deceptive trade practices leading to a multi-million dollar commercial loss for a North Carolina warehouse owner.
  
• Successfully obtained a defense verdict in a 2005 toxic tort case against 14 Teamsters alleging chemical exposure in a highway tractor plant over a series of months.
  
• Successfully obtained the dismissal of a case on the eve of trial for a highway tractor manufacturer against multiple trucking companies alleging commercial losses due to multiple defects in their fleets.
  
• Successfully obtained summary judgment on the eve of trial for an auto manufacturer in a wrongful death case alleging defective restraint.
  
• Currently serving as local counsel in East Texas on an intellectual property case involving entertainment systems in automobiles.
  
• Currently representing a manufacturer as a plaintiff against one of its suppliers who provided defective fuel systems for its product.
  
• Currently defending a manufacturer from a suppliers claim that the manufacturer breached its master distribution agreement leading to commercial losses.

PROFESSIONAL AFFILIATIONS

Products Liability Advisory Council
Defense Research Institute
Dallas Bar Association

NOTEWORTHY

Served as Teaching Assistant to Professor Henry Abraham, Constitutional Law, University of Virginia

Honor Counsel, University of Virginia Honor System

Enjoys woodworking, writing and politics