David Molton

Practice Areas

LITIGATION & DISPUTE RESOLUTION

BANKRUPTCY & RESTRUCTURING

BANKRUPTCY LITIGATION

MASS TORTS BANKRUPTCY

FINTECH

DISTRESSED REAL ESTATE

CLASS ACTIONS AND MULTI-DISTRICT LITIGATION

Career

David Molton is a partner in the firm’s Litigation & Dispute Resolution and Bankruptcy & Corporate Restructuring Practice Groups and is the chair of cross-border, mass tort, and restructuring litigation.

David focuses his practice in complex financial, commercial and mass tort litigation matters in federal, state and bankruptcy courts in the United States, and he represents foreign liquidators, official committees of creditors, unofficial ad hoc committees of creditors and interested parties in financial fraud and mass tort related litigations and bankruptcies in the United States and in foreign jurisdictions.

David is ranked in Chambers USA and The Legal 500, where he has been specifically recognized for his “strength in mass tort Chapter 11 proceedings.” In the 2023 guides, clients have made the following comments: “David Molton is quite simply superb: head and shoulders, one of the best US attorneys I have worked with over the last 30 years in practice. He possesses a fabulous legal and strategic intellect.” “He's well respected, practical and a great strategic thinker.” “His depth of knowledge is incredible.” “He has really clear strategic thought, he's incredibly approachable and a great team player.” In Benchmark Litigation, David is commended as “a true trial lawyer” and “a strategic thinker who plays the long game and doesn’t get bogged down in the short-game issues.”

David is a fellow of INSOL International, a world-wide federation of national associations for lawyers, accountants and other professionals who specialize in financial fraud, asset tracing and recovery and insolvency in domestic and cross-border cases.

After graduating from New York University School of Law, David clerked for the Honorable J. Edward Lumbard of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. Earlier in his career, David served as an assistant district attorney in and for the Office of the District Attorney for New York County, where he was assigned to the Special Narcotics Prosecutor for the City of New York under the Honorable Sterling Johnson, Jr. As a prosecutor, David supervised joint federal/state law enforcement task force teams and investigations for the New York Drug Enforcement Task Force and the Department of Justice’s Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force, and he prosecuted cases involving (i) racketeering enterprises and organized crime narcotics conspiracies and distribution networks, and (ii) efforts to locate, seize and effectuate the forfeiture of proceeds and assets connected to those criminal activities both in the United States and abroad.

Professional Memberships

Fellow, INSOL International

Member, International Insolvency Institute

Work Highlights

David’s more recent engagements include:

Crown Boiler: Official Committee of Unsecured Creditors in the Chapter 11 case of Crown Boiler, a manufacturer of residential and commercial heating equipment.

Vanderbilt Minerals: Talc-Asbestos Claimants Committee in the Chapter 11 case of Vanderbilt Minerals, a Connecticut-based mining company.

Carbon Health Technologies: Official Committee of Unsecured Creditors in the Chapter 11 case of Carbon Health Technologies, a California-based health technology company and modern healthcare provider.

Valves and Controls US: Asbestos Claimants Committee in Chapter 11 case of Valves and Controls US, a valve manufacturer for the oil and gas industry.

Red River Talc: Official Committee of Talc Claimants in Chapter 11 case of Red River Talc, a subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson.

Tehum Care Services: Bankruptcy counsel to the Official Committee of Tort Claimants in the Chapter 11 case of Tehum Care Services (f/k/a Corizon Health), a provider of nationwide healthcare services to prisons and jails. After successfully defeating a Rule 9019 settlement, we created a Chapter 11 plan structure that provides substantially higher recoveries for tort victims and provides each tort victim with the choice of continuing their litigation unfettered against non-debtor defendants in the civil justice system or participating in a settlement fund created by the Chapter 11 plan. If confirmed, this case will mark the first time a divisive merger case resulted in a confirmed Chapter 11 plan and a settlement that provides actual compensation to tort victims and, at the same time, actual optionality to tort victims who want to pursue their claims.

Cosmed: Official Committee of Unsecured Creditors in Chapter 11 case of Cosmed, a provider of sterilization services.

Exactech: Official Committee of Unsecured Creditors in Chapter 11 case of Exactech, a manufacturer of joint implants.

Hector DAO: The receivers of Hector DAO in achieving the first Chapter 15 recognition of a foreign main proceeding in which the debtor was a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO), a community-led entity owned by its members on an open-source blockchain.

Representation of the Unsecured Creditors Committee of Barretts Minerals, Inc., comprised solely of asbestos claimants. Barretts Minerals, Inc. (“BMI”), a subsidiary of Minerals Technologies Inc., owns and operates talc mines in Montana and supplied talc for industrial and cosmetic end uses. BMI filed a voluntary petition under Chapter 11 in a stated attempt to execute a sale of its operating assets and negotiate a section 524(g) bankruptcy trust. The Committee instructed Brown Rudnick to seek to transfer venue of the cases from the Southern District of Texas to the District of Montana. While the Bankruptcy Court denied the motion, the Committee has appealed the decision. Global mediation has recently commenced. Additionally, the Committee opposed the Debtor’s request to extend the automatic stay to non-debtor affiliates. As a result of that opposition and after a trial on the matter, the Court partially granted the Debtor’s requested relief but found in favor of the Committee in holding that independent claims brought by mesothelioma victims against non-debtor affiliates of BMI alleging direct tortious conduct by the non-debtor affiliate as a result of that affiliate’s testing of the Debtor’s talc, would not be stayed.

Representing the Official Unsecured Creditors’ Committee in the bankruptcy cases of Kidde-Fenwal, Inc. (“KFI”). KFI is the first major bankruptcy case involving mass-tort liability to water-providers, property owners, personal injury victims, and governments stemming from the manufacture and sale of PFAS chemicals, primarily their Aqueous Film Forming Foam (“AFFF”). KFI, a subsidiary of Carrier-Global, filed for Ch. 11 protection on the heels of several large industry settlements involving other major manufacturers of AFFF in the AFFF multi-district litigation. Brown Rudnick is honored to represent the plaintiffs and all other unsecured creditors in this milestone bankruptcy case.

Representing the Official Committee of Talc Claimants in the LTL Management LLC (J&J) bankruptcy case. In October 2021, Johnson & Johnson (J&J) completed a broadly observed and highly controversial corporate transaction, colloquially referred to as the “Texas two-step,” dividing the company’s consumer products division into two companies, and transferring all of the company’s talc-related tort liabilities to the newly created entity, LTL Management LLC (“LTL” stands for “Legacy Tort Liabilities”). It then filed LTL for bankruptcy, demanding that the court extend all bankruptcy protections to the entire J&J conglomerate (notwithstanding the fact that only LTL filed for bankruptcy).

Education