Mintz Grabs Perkins Coie White-Collar Partner in San Diego

Sean Prosser, Mintz.
Sean Prosser, Mintz.

Sean Prosser of Mintz, Levin, Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky and Popeo. Courtesy photo.

Mintz, Levin, Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky and Popeo has added to its white-collar practice on the West Coast, bringing on a lawyer with experience at several Big Law firms, most recently Perkins Coie.

Sean Prosser made a move to the Boston-based firm as it grows its California presence. He was a partner at Seattle-based Perkins Coie, where he led the firm’s white-collar, government investigations and securities litigation practices in Southern California.

“They reached out to me and reminded me that some of my former colleagues at prior firms have joined Mintz," Prosser said, noting the firm's expansion in general. "Particularly Mintz San Diego and Mintz Los Angeles have been expanding pretty significantly.”

Prosser’s former colleague, Scott Stanton, who previously served as the head of the corporate practice at Morrison & Foerster, also joined Mintz last summer as a partner in its San Diego office.

Prosser, who was previously an SEC enforcement attorney, primarily defends clients facing shareholder lawsuits, SEC investigations, DOJ investigations and grand jury proceedings, and other civil and criminal government investigations.

“Because I do securities litigation and white collar, focusing on businesses, having a strong corporate practice is pretty important to what I do,” Prosser added. “I was able to reconnect with people on the corporate side I have worked with successfully at other firms.”

Before entering private practice, Prosser worked as an enforcement attorney at the SEC in its Pacific Regional Office in Los Angeles from 1992 to 1994. Then he joined Brobeck, Phleger & Harrison and then Fish & Richardson in 2003, where he led that firm's West Coast white-collar, government and securities litigation group. After that, Prosser spent nearly a decade at Morrison & Foerster before moving over to Perkins Coie in 2014.

Prosser emphasized Mintz's strong securities litigation and white-collar roots on the East Coast as a draw. He said he currently has two high-profile insider trading cases across the country, one in the Southern District of New York and one in the District of New Jersey.

“I am on the East Coast a lot, so having that expertise on the East Coast is very valuable to my clients, and to me," he said.

According to his firm profile, Prosser has represented public and private companies, officers and directors, board committees, broker-dealers, banks, investment advisers, hedge funds, certified public accountants, individual stock traders and public officials.

At Mintz, Prosser will split his time between the firm’s San Diego and Los Angeles offices.

Mintz’s San Diego office, which opened in 2006, now has approximately 60 lawyers. And in Los Angeles, the firm recently expanded, doubling its square footage at the Century Plaza Towers to accommodate a growing team of lawyers, which expanded from three to 12 in less than two years.

In a statement welcoming Prosser, Mintz managing member Bob Bodian said, “Growing a premier practice with national scope has long been a key strategic objective for the firm, and Sean is the latest addition in a string of top talent to recently join the group, including Jason Halperin, David Siegel, Pete Michaels, David Ward and Dan Conley.”

Perkins Coie did not respond to a request for comment on Prosser’s departure.

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