Lynne M. Kizis

Lynne M. Kizis is a Shareholder of Wilentz and administers the firm’s Mass Tort / Class Action team. She has practiced in the fields of complex, class action and mass tort litigation since joining Wilentz in 1989. Ms. Kizis has represented victims of occupational and environmental illness in trial and appellate courts for personal injury, wrongful death, property damage and economic loss due to hazardous substances including asbestos, lead, and toxic chemicals, as well as dangerous pharmaceutical products, and defective consumer products. She has tried serious cases to verdict, settled numerous $1 million plus cases, and second-chaired the largest punitive damage verdict against an asbestos company in New Jersey. She has been a leader and advocate for the New Jersey plaintiffs asbestos bar. She has served as lead or co-lead counsel in a variety of class actions.

Ms. Kizis has been distinguished with a Martindale Hubble AV® Preeminent Peer Review Rating, as a New Jersey Super Lawyer for Class Action and Mass Tort, and Best Lawyers in America. She ranked in the 2012 Top 50 Women Lawyers. The Mass Tort/Class Action Team Ms. Kizis co-leads has been distinguished as National and New Jersey Tier 1 US News & World Report Best Law Firms 2010-2011, 2011-2012. The pioneering work of this team has earned clients over 1.5 billion dollars in settlements.

In addition to her extensive legal practice, Ms. Kizis has been a frequent author and lecturer for the New Jersey Association for Justice(NJAJ), formerly Association of Trial Lawyers of America-New Jersey (ATLA-NJ), the New Jersey State Bar Association, the Middlesex County Bar Association and the New Jersey Institute of Continuing Legal Education, on a variety of topics including products liability, procedural and evidence issues, liens, ethics issues, causation and other tort issues, consumer fraud and class action law, and issues of women in the law. She has served on the Board of Governors of NJAJ/ATLA-NJ since 1998 and is an officer; Parliamentarian 2011 – 2012. She serves on the Class Action Committee and Consumer Protection Law Committee as well as the Products Liability and Toxic Tort Section of the New Jersey State Bar Association. She is a Bencher/Barrister Member of the Halpern – Furman Inn of Court since 1994 and serves as its Counsel since 2010. She has served continually on the Superior Court of New Jersey Middlesex County Asbestos Advisory Council since 1996 and on its Mass Tort Electronic Filing Committee since 1997, and previously served on the Mass Tort Advisory Committee to the New Jersey Supreme Court.

Area of Emphasis:

Asbestos Litigation
Products Liability
Occupational Disease
Defective Consumer Products
Defective Drugs & Medical Devices
Consumer Fraud
Health Care
Class Action Litigation