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UME 3
OL
UMBER
Trial lawyer finds success inside and outside the courtroom
by Olivia Clarke
painting of an airplane and two
A
stick figures hangs on Roger
Pascal’s office wall.
A 14-year-old boy painted the
picture to thank Pascal, a Schiff
Hardin partner, for flying him and
two other boys to Milwaukee for
lunch. They participated in a
program that gives inner-city
children a chance to experience
their first flight outside of Illinois.
“It’s rewarding for the person
who does it,” Pascal said. “Who
wouldn’t want to take a bunch of
wide-eyed kids on their first flight?”
Doing good deeds seems to
simply be a part of Pascal’s
everyday life. But he gets
embarrassed taking credit for his
volunteer work because he enjoys
these experiences just as much as
the people he is helping.
When he’s not doing his day job
as a trial lawyer, he’s volunteering to
fly patients to hospitals,
participating in legal groups,
working with the ACLU of Illinois,
and spending time with his family.
Friends and family describe
Pascal as a tenacious lawyer who
doesn’t enter a courtroom
unprepared and can be dogged in
his litigation. But at the same time
he’s a modest lawyer who firmly
believes he has an obligation to
serve others through his pro bono
efforts.
“Roger is the lawyer you want
with you in a life-or-death case if
you were in a criminal trial, or the
bet-the-company case in a civil
trial,” said Colleen Connell,
executive director of the ACLU of
Illinois. “He is extremely smart,
Partner Roger Pascal, who keeps busy as a trial lawyer at Schiff Hardin, also does pro bono work and uses
his pilot skills to occasionally fly people in need of medical treatment to hospitals and medical centers.
incredibly quick, and very
principled.
“If you were in the legal
equivalent of a dark alley, Roger is
Pascal: “You don’t always win,
but I’ve won enough to keep it
interesting and rewarding.”
the guy you want at your side. He is
that good.”
Creating a life as a lawyer
Pascal, a lawyer for 42 years,
chose law because he wanted a
career that involved a life of
learning.
“I decided to be a lawyer
basically when I applied to law
school,” said the 66-year-old lawyer
who has spent his entire
professional legal career at Schiff
Hardin. “We couldn’t afford, I
couldn’t afford getting a law degree,
just to say I had a law degree. I
needed to give the law profession a
try because by the time I was in my
first year of law school I was
married and had a child.
“I always had to work for a
living. And, fortunately, I think the
law and I have had a pretty good
relationship for a long time.”
Today he is a trial lawyer who
handles a cornucopia of commercial
litigation including trade secrets,
patents, contracts, securities,
antitrust, and business tort cases.
When asked to describe himself
he says, simply, that he’s a lawyer.
“It is what I do and probably
that’s what I am,” said Pascal, who
was head of the firm’s General
Litigation Practice Group for 20
years and is now chair of the group.
“All my other interests in one way or
another flow from my curiosity.
Being a trial lawyer is being
curious.”
Heidi Dalenberg, a partner at
Schiff Hardin, describes Pascal as
an “inventive, creative, aggressive,
and thorough” lawyer.
“He’s got such personal
magnetism,” Dalenberg said. “You
can’t be in a room and not know
Roger is there. He’s got a very
forceful personality. He has a terrific
sense of humor. He is a very hardworking lawyer.”
Dalenberg said Pascal’s pro bono
efforts have encouraged a slew of
people at the firm to make a similar
commitment to pro bono.
Pascal started doing pro bono
work in law school as a member of
the Harvard Voluntary Defenders,
which was made up of law students
who volunteered to represent
indigent criminal defendants in
felony show cause hearings and
misdemeanor trials, and to help with
post-conviction legal advice.
Law students in this group were
allowed to practice in court under a
Massachusetts rule similar to
Illinois’ 711 rule. Second-year
students generally went to the jail to
interview prisoners, and third-year
students got experience in the
courtroom, he said.
During his time in the group, its
vice president of research and
appeals, James Zagel, who is today
a U.S. district judge, asked Pascal to
assist a Rhode Island public
defender on an appeal in a murder
case, State v. Bradshaw. Pascal
wrote a draft of a brief for the
appeal. But after the appeal was
filed, he learned from the public
defender that it was filed exactly the
way he had written it.
“I was taken aback,” he said. “I
don’t know if I started shaking. I felt
kind of a sinking feeling. That was
pretty scary.”
But about two months after he
joined Schiff Hardin, he was
pleased to learn that the Rhode
Island Supreme Court reversed the
conviction.
“When you have that kind of
good fortune, that gets you pretty
excited,” he said. “I have had the
good fortune to be motivated by
good results or exciting cases even if
the result wasn’t good.
“You don’t always win, but I’ve
won enough to keep it interesting
and rewarding.”
In addition to his regular case
Peters: “Roger is incredibly
dedicated and tenacious.”
work, he has also found rewarding
experiences in his pro bono work.
He helped start the Schiff
Hardin/Howard Area Community
Center Legal Clinic. And today his
pro bono work includes sitting on
several boards, including the Public
Interest Law Initiative.
“Most lawyers who embrace
public-interest work do it because
they believe the profession owes it
to the community that gives a lawyer
a license,” he said.
“It may not sound like much,
but to secure a divorce for a client
who is struggling through all kinds
of issues in their life, maybe their
spouse is abusive or holding that
party back, even doing a divorce for
a person who cannot afford to have a
lawyer can be very rewarding,
because the alternative is for them
to have no access to what people
with means have.”
Protecting civil liberties
As general counsel for the ACLU
of Illinois for about 20 years, Pascal
acts as the liaison between the legal
staff and the board, and is a legal
adviser to the organization and its
staff, Connell said. He is also on the
board.
“Roger himself and the partners
and associates at his firm have
contributed millions of dollars in
attorney time advancing civil rights
and civil liberties over the last 20
years,” she said.
One such case was B.H., et al. v.
Samuels, which Pascal brought to
Schiff Hardin. The case involved the
Illinois Department of Children and
Family Services and the systemic
problems with the way foster care
was handled. Dalenberg and others
in the firm worked with the ACLU to
negotiate a consent decree, and
monitoring of the department’s
improvements continues.
Dalenberg said the case
addressed the deprivation of foster
children’s constitutional rights due
to the level of care and the systemwide problems. This included
everything from inadequate
education to constantly moving the
children around, she said.
“What happened is, we went
from being a state with the very
worst foster care providers to being
one of the best,” she said.
Pascal worked with the ACLU on
K.L. v. Edgar, a suit that challenged
the adequacy of care received by
adult mental health patients in nine
state hospitals. He personally
visited Chicago Read Mental Health
Center and spent the day touring the
facility and observing the
conditions.
A settlement in the case was
reached that met the objectives,
Pascal said.
“Roger is so principled and so
passionate about defending the
constitution,” Connell said. “He
really does see that as lawyers we
are taking an oath, which we do to
uphold the constitution of the state
of Illinois and the United States.
Roger takes it very seriously.”
The Bill of Rights is
fundamental to what it means for us
to be Americans, Pascal said.
Litigating civil liberties cases means
having to sometimes represent
unpopular clients, he said.
“It is about the system. It can’t
work if lawyers won’t take cases
because they don’t like their
clients,” Pascal said. “Lawyers are
not supposed to love their clients.
They are supposed to love the law.
The whole theory of the system is, if
you have well-prepared advocates
arguing each side, the truth is going
to come out.”
His wife, Missy, said her
husband has spent his entire legal
career doing public service in
addition to handling a very active
private practice. He has defended
people’s constitutional rights
through cases involving such issues
as fair housing, and the hiring and
promotion of black police officers.
“Being a trial lawyer carries a
certain Type A personality, but that
doesn’t preclude you from also
taking those skills and using them
to help others, and using it for
public good and public interest,”
she said.
Shaping his career
Schiff Hardin partner Charles
“Chip” Peters said Pascal is
thinking about his cases even when
he isn’t actively working on them.
“Roger is incredibly dedicated
and tenacious,” said Peters, who has
worked with Pascal for about 20
years. “Some would say he is
dogged in his litigation. He doesn’t
always look at cases the
conventional way and is willing to
look at new angles and to see where
the law should be going, not just
where it’s been.”
Peters considers Pascal a mentor
not only for teaching him different
legal skills, but also for serving as a
professional role model. He has
taught him through his willingness
to do pro bono work and in how he
stays true to his convictions.
But Pascal has also pushed him
to step back at times and enjoy the
journey, Peters said.
“There are certain common
elements in all lawsuits, even some
common elements between criminal
and civil, as well as in different
types of civil cases,” Pascal said.
“But the subject matter varies from
case to case. We have the
opportunity to educate ourselves
with every new area we deal with.
That’s why it stays fresh for me.”
Early in his career, at age 35, he
argued Boston Stock Exchange v.
New York State Tax Commission
before the U.S. Supreme Court, an
experience he calls remarkable,
especially considering they had lost
in each of the three New York state
courts.
Pascal represented the Detroit,
Boston, Midwest, Pacific Coast,
Cincinnati and PBW regional stock
exchanges. The issue was whether
the amendments to the New York
stock transfer tax statute
discriminated against interstate
commerce by taxing more favorably
the transfer of securities traded on
New York exchanges than the
Pascal: “Doesn’t everybody want
to fly? What could be more fun
than flying an airplane?”
transfer of securities traded on
exchanges in other states.
He said it might have seemed
like a boring case to those who
visited the Supreme Court that day,
but to lawyers and the securities
community it was an important one.
He said he believed the SEC and
other policy makers viewed a
discriminatory transfer tax as an
unwelcome restraint on free and
open interstate competition in the
securities markets.
Pascal prepared for the
experience by going through several
moot courts. The moot courts
challenged him in ways that were
tougher than what he would
experience from the justices —
although not too much tougher, he
said.
“It was a remarkable experience
because of the sheer magnitude of
the institution. For a lawyer,
especially a trial lawyer, which
includes lawyers who argue appeals,
it is the ultimate forum,” he said.
Seven of the nine justices asked
him questions, and, in the end, the
justices ruled unanimously in his
clients’ favor.
“Everyone always dreams of
arguing before [the Supreme Court]
because they are so well-prepared
and they have a vision that is
broader than that single case,” he
said. “They expect the lawyer
arguing before them to understand
not just the cases that are important
to their position but to understand
considerations that move the court
one way or another.”
He said he has worked on many
other cases that have given him
great satisfaction because they
continued to ignite his passion for
practicing the law.
Peters and Pascal worked
together on the case, In-Flight
Phone Corp. v. AT&T Wireless, for 10
years. It was tried twice, once
without a jury and once with a jury.
Pascal and Peters won both trials.
The case, a complex and protracted
trade secret dispute, involved a
huge number of legal and
technological issues, Pascal said.
Jack Goeken, a founder of MCI,
claimed that their client, AT&T
Wireless, had taken technology and
business information in order to
start up a competitive air-to-ground
phone system, Peters said. But the
jury found that a release Goeken
signed should be enforced, and the
information he claimed was a trade
secret was not, he said.
Through the case, PepsiCo, Inc.
v. Redmond and the Quaker Oats
Co., Pascal and other members of
the firm developed the now widely
utilized doctrine of “inevitable
disclosure” to enjoin a departing
executive from competing against
his former employer by “inevitably”
utilizing specific sensitive
information gained during his prior
employment.
“Inevitable disclosure is
something of a cottage industry,” he
said. “It has created a lot of
litigation, both pro and con.”
Outside the courtroom
Pascal said he has found a way
to maintain a career he enjoys
without sacrificing a life outside of
the firm.
“I would like to think that it is a
combination of energy and just a
refusal to be a single-dimensional
person,” Pascal said. “My early
years of practice weren’t so multidimensional. I think I am probably a
better grandfather than a father. It is
very difficult to find the time to do
anything other than the law. Lawyers
work hard. It is very difficult to
succeed without being dedicated.”
He says his wife holds a lot of
the responsibility for their having a
full life. She is always game for new
adventures and activities, he said.
Even Pascal’s attire shows this
balance of being a lawyer and
having outside interests. An orange
and black sports watch peeks out
from under his suit coat. It’s a
waterproof Timex digital watch that
has two time zones and a timer,
which he uses when he pilots his
plane.
A pilot since 1977, Pascal has
participated in volunteer flight
programs. For between 10 and 15
years he has flown a couple of
mission trips each year through
LifeLine Pilots, which facilitates the
transporting of patients for on-going
medical treatments, diagnosis and
follow-up care through a pilot
donation of flight expenses and
time.
He has flown patients to such
places as Mayo Clinic. He may fly
the whole journey or a leg of the trip
— depending on how far away the
hospital or medical facility is located.
“Pilots are always looking for a
good, rewarding reason to fly,” he
said. “When you actually do
something that renders a very
serious, valuable service that a
human being needs — that is the
complete package there.”
He shares a Bonanza singleengine, four-seat plane with a
couple of partners. He enjoys flying
his family and friends on day and
Pascal: “There are things in
life other than this very
challenging profession.”
weekend trips to such places as
Door County or Mackinac Island.
“Doesn’t everybody want to fly?”
he said. “What could be more fun
than flying an airplane? For a lot of
us the sheer joy of flying an airplane
is something special.
“Part of it is, human beings like
to separate themselves from human
beings by doing something that
everybody else can’t do. I think
there is some of that. It can be a
very cool way to get around.”
Besides flying, he and his wife
have enjoyed scuba diving for 25
years, but they now mostly snorkel.
Photos of fish they’ve seen on their
different excursions decorate his
office.
He and his wife met while they
both attended the University of
Michigan. She was a freshman and
he was a sophomore. They both were
interested in the business side of
the school newspaper and were
arguing over whose fault it was that
an ad did not look right, he said.
While he attended law school,
she worked as a social worker and
supported him. Pascal wanted to
figure out a way to repay her while
she was working and he was home
studying — so he taught himself
how to bake bread.
Today they have three children
and two grandchildren. His friends
and family say he’s known for his
bread-baking talents, which
includes whole grain and rye loaves,
as well as round rustic loaves.
When asked how he finds that
balance between practicing the law
and enjoying life, he says, “There
are things in life other than this
very challenging profession. The
question is, what you do with the
time? We try to max out on good
things to do.”
Reprinted with permission from Chicago Lawyer, May 2007.