David Lebowitz is an experienced trial and appellate lawyer who has recovered over $50 million on behalf of a diverse mix of individuals and organizations in civil rights cases, class actions, and commercial disputes. In his civil rights practice, he has successfully represented wrongfully convicted exonerees, victims of law enforcement brutality, people facing housing and employment discrimination, victims of sexual assault and harassment, and children and people with disabilities subjected to abuse and mistreatment. A member of New York City’s LGBTQ+ community, David also represents children and adults who have been bullied at school, denied housing opportunities, harassed at work, or otherwise discriminated against because of their sexual orientation or gender identity.

David has also represented employees and consumers in complex class actions against businesses and non-profit institutions, as well as plaintiffs and defendants in commercial matters involving breach of contract and business torts. He maintains an active appellate practice in both state and federal appeals courts. His experience includes securing the largest settlement ever recovered against the New York State Office for People with Developmental Disabilities for abuse and neglect of group home residents, obtaining one of the largest wrongful conviction settlements in New York City history, and winning a landmark First Amendment appeal to unseal court records involving sex trafficking allegations against Jeffrey Epstein.

Before helping to found KLLF, David handled civil rights and commercial cases at a premiere New York boutique litigation firm. He previously clerked for the Honorable Kim McLane Wardlaw of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and worked with the NAACP Legal Defense Fund and the ACLU National Prison Project. David received his law degree from Yale Law School, where he represented prisoners in solitary confinement and received the Michael Egger Prize for best student Note or Comment on current social problems for his work on prosecutorial misconduct.

Outside the courtroom, David enjoys international travel, eating his way across New York City, and attempting to provide the excellent standard of service demanded by his rescue cocker spaniel.

Representative cases

David’s work includes:

• Currently representing exoneree Ralph Birch in his civil right lawsuit against the Town of New Milford, Connecticut, and several Town and State police officials alleging that police misconduct caused his wrongful conviction for the 1985 murder of Everett Carr and resulting 30 years of wrongful incarceration. Birch v. Town of New Milford, 2021 WL 4932405 (D. Conn. Sept. 24, 2021).

• Winning an injunction to prevent arbitrary disenfranchisement of New Jersey voters whose ballots risked rejection due to alleged signature discrepancies. League of Women Voters of New Jersey v. Way, No. 20 Civ. 5990 (D.N.J. 2020).

• Representing four men who were brutally assaulted by the NYPD while peacefully protesting against police violence in downtown Brooklyn after George Floyd’s murder. Gelbard v. City of New York, No. 20 Civ. 3163 (E.D.N.Y. 2020).

• Litigating a class action on behalf of tens of thousands of people illegally detained by the New York City Department of Correction despite being entitled to release on bail. Lynch v. City of New York, 335 F. Supp. 3d 645 (S.D.N.Y. 2018).

• Recovering over $30 million in state and federal lawsuits on behalf of three individuals wrongfully convicted and imprisoned as a result of an improper 1995 Bronx double‑murder investigation. Vazquez v. City of New York, 2014 WL 4388497 (S.D.N.Y. 2014).*

• Securing a $6 million settlement for developmentally disabled adults who were abused and neglected by staff at their State-run group home, along with an injunction transferring the facility out of State control. D.K. by L.K. v. Teams, 260 F. Supp. 3d 334 (S.D.N.Y. 2017).*

• Winning a First Amendment appeal to secure public release of sealed court records concerning allegations of sex trafficking by Jeffrey Epstein. Brown v. Maxwell, 929 F.3d 41 (2d Cir. 2019).*

• Obtaining a $6.6 million class action settlement for former medical residents in a case against their training hospital involving novel commercial tort claims and complex federal taxation issues. Simon, et al. v. New York and Presbyterian Hospital, 36 F. Supp. 3d 292 (S.D.N.Y. 2014).*

• Achieving a substantial monetary settlement on behalf of teenager who was illegally placed in foster care without required judicial oversight or parental consent and forcibly separated from his mother in the last two years of her life. P.P. v. City of New York, 2014 WL 4704800 (S.D.N.Y. 2014).*

• Successfully representing a commercial real estate broker in multiple litigations alleging breach of contract for failure to pay renewal and extension commissions. Schlesinger & Co., LLC v. George Comfort & Sons, Inc., 2016 WL 740320 (N.Y. Cnty. Sup. Ct. 2016).*

• On behalf of a strategic communications firm and its principal, obtaining dismissal of a lawsuit alleging defamation and tortious interference with prospective economic advantage arising from comments to the press. Cipriani v. Bunting, 2017 WL 3616371 (N.Y. Cnty. Sup. Ct. 2017).*
  
  *David worked on these matters at his prior firm.

Publications:
The Justice System’s Tunnel Vision: How Cops and Prosecutors, Worried They’ll Have to Turn Over Brady Material, Don’t Even Look for It, N.Y. Daily News, Oct. 17, 2016.

“Proper Subjects for Medical Treatment?" Addiction, Prison-Based Drug Treatment, and the Eighth Amendment, 14 DePaul J. Health Care L. 271 (2012).

The Myth of Prosecutorial Accountability After Connick v. Thompson: Why Existing Professional Responsibility Measures Cannot Protect Against Prosecutorial Misconduct, 121 Yale L.J. Online 203 (2011) (with David Keenan, Tamar Lerer, and Jane Cooper).