John M. Brickman, head of litigation in the Firm’s Long Island office, practices primarily in the areas of commercial and trust and estate litigation and alternative dispute resolution.  He has tried more than 100 cases before federal and state courts and arbitration tribunals, and has argued more than 100 appeals.  He devotes particular attention to contract, corporate, partnership, employment, trust and estate, intellectual property, unfair competition, civil racketeering, real estate, and construction cases, and frequently represents parties in disputes between principals of professional practices and substantial closely-held businesses. 

His recent (2022-23) successful representations include winning, defending on appeal, and collecting a judgment of more than $1 million for clients whose cooperative apartment had suffered damages from 15 years of uncorrected water infiltration; winning and sustaining on appeal a judgment of adverse possession granting the owner of a property in Midtown Manhattan full title, notwithstanding a relative’s claim to own half the property; and winning summary judgment for a physician, dismissing claims by the purchaser of his practice that he had committed fraud and violated non-competition provisions in the documents by which he sold his practice.

Mr. Brickman combines legal practice with public service.  Since 2016, he has served as a Commissioner of the New York State Legislative Ethics Commission.  From 2007 until 2011, he was a Commissioner of the New York State Commission on Public Integrity, the agency that that enforced state lobbying and public employee ethics laws and regulations.  He was a Director of the Nassau Health Care Corporation, which operates the Nassau University Medical Center, from 2005 to 2009.  From 2005 to 2008, he served as Chairman of the Correctional Association of New York, an organization founded in 1844 that visits prisons and does research and advocacy in criminal justice issues.  Mr. Brickman serves as a director of several not-for-profit organizations, including the Abraham Lincoln Brigade Archives and the NuHealth Foundation.  He has been a Director of The Levitt Foundation (from 2011 to 2014 he was also its President) and the Long Island Medical Foundation.  From 1992 to 1994 he served as a Trustee of The Johns Hopkins University and President of The Johns Hopkins Alumni Association. Since 2006, he has been a member of the National Panel of Arbitrators of the American Arbitrators Association. He has been appointed as Arbitrator in more than fifty AAA cases.

Mr. Brickman is pro bono legal counsel to the Manhasset-Great Neck Community Service Center, and is active in bar association, educational, and community activities. For many years, he chaired a Continuing Legal Education program on lawyers’ ethics and civility, presented annually by the New York State Bar Association.  From 1991 to 2006, he was Adjunct Professor of Law at Touro College, Jacob D. Fuchsberg Law Center, where he taught the course in Pre-Trial Litigation to senior law students.  He writes and speaks regularly on public and professional issues, including governmental and legal ethics and the administration of correctional and criminal justice agencies.

Mr. Brickman received his undergraduate degree from The Johns Hopkins University and his J.D. degree cum laude in 1969 from Columbia University School of Law, where he was a Harlan Fiske Stone Scholar and Dean’s List Scholar and served as Revision Editor of the Columbia Journal of Law and Social Problems. From 1971 to 1975, he served as Executive Director of the New York City Board of Correction, the agency of New York City government that oversees the operation of the New York City jail system and issues reports and recommendations for change.