Heaven Chee

Commercial Litigation | Antitrust | Banking & Financial Services | Intellectual Property | Securities Litigation & Regulation

Heaven C. Chee is a Partner at León Cosgrove Jiménez, LLP in Houston, TX. Her practice focuses on high-stakes commercial disputes, particularly in the technology, financial services, and energy industries. She is an experienced trial and appellate lawyer who has worked cases from their early pre-suit stages through their final dispositions on appeal.

Ms. Chee has achieved significant victories for her clients, including defending a major pharmaceutical company against a False Claims Act suit alleging billions in damages, securing dismissal of Sherman Act violation claims against a French aviation company, obtaining a nine-figure judgment in a federal bench trial, and winning a multi-million-dollar verdict for a European cosmetic distributor. While these cases reflect her successes on the merits, Heaven understands the need for efficient, strategic resolutions at earlier stages. For example, she represented a major sports league in two cases—one where the plaintiff voluntarily dismissed his copyright claim with prejudice after preliminary discovery and another where the plaintiff’s claims (which included fraud and civil RICO) were dismissed and the plaintiff was barred from bringing future suits.

Outside of Ms. Chee’s industry focuses, she has also developed an expertise in antitrust and securities litigation. In one particularly high-profile case, she represented a major technology company against a coalition of government enforcers aiming to dismantle the company for alleged antitrust violations in its advertising technology practices. She was also part of a team that secured a favorable settlement for a global investment bank, which was one of the firms sued by the FDIC for alleged securities fraud arising out of the 2008–2009 residential mortgage-backed securities crisis. Ms. Chee recently tried a case to a federal jury, successfully representing a Florida community bank against directors who were found to have breached their fiduciary duties. She also defended a major national banking association in a FINRA arbitration, eventually resulting in the plaintiffs settling for less than 1% of the damages alleged.

She is often invited to speak at conferences, including the State Bar of Texas courses in Civil Trials, Evidence & Discovery, and Business Disputes. She has been recognized as Lawdragon 500 X’s Next Generation, with ALM’s On the Rise Texas Legal Award, with the National Asian Pacific American Bar Association’s Best Under 40 Award, and as a “Texas Rising Star” by Super Lawyers and a “One to Watch” by Best Lawyers in America.

Ms. Chee graduated from Rice University and the University of Virginia School of Law and clerked for Judges George C. Hanks, Jr. and Yvonne Y. Ho of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas. Before joining León Cosgrove Jiménez, LLP as a founding partner in the Houston office, she practiced at Hogan Lovells US LLP and Yetter Coleman LLP.