Wilkinson Stekloff is pleased to announce that Sarah Neuman, Anastasia Pastan, and Matthew Skanchy have been promoted to counsel effective January 1, 2023.
“Sarah, Anastasia, and Matthew have all been with our firm since very early on. We are grateful for their many contributions to the growth of our team, and proud of all the successes they have achieved on behalf of our clients,” said Wilkinson Stekloff Founding Partner Brian Stekloff. “Our mission is not just to hire outstanding attorneys — we strive to give them meaningful trial experience and client exposure. These three next-generation trial lawyers embody that commitment and have demonstrated their excellence and leadership throughout their careers.”
Sarah has been a member of numerous trial teams, including the team that secured a complete defense verdict in a multi-state consumer fraud class action involving Bayer’s One A Day multivitamins, and the trial teams that prevailed in the first two state-court bellwether trials involving Bayer’s Xarelto. Sarah has also played a key role in the firm’s confidential merger matters, and currently is representing Microsoft in an FTC suit challenging Microsoft’s proposed acquisition of Activision Blizzard King. Sarah maintains an active pro bono practice, representing clients in both trial and appellate matters. She recently secured asylum for a Cameroonian teacher who had been tortured amid violent conflict. Before joining the firm, Sarah served as a law clerk to the Honorable Julie E. Carnes of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit and the Honorable Beryl A. Howell of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. She graduated from The University of Chicago Law School, where she was the Executive Editor of The University of Chicago Law Review.
Anastasia has been a member of multiple trial teams, including the defense team for Bayer that won a complete defense verdict in Cooney v. Janssen, the third state-court bellwether trial involving Xarelto. She was also a member of the team representing Bayer in coordinated trial proceedings in California involving Essure, a permanent contraception device. And she played a key role on the defense team in Northrup v. Covidien, litigation involving hernia mesh products, in which the U.S. district court issued a decisive pretrial victory. Most recently, Anastasia has focused her work on the FTC suit challenging Microsoft’s proposed acquisition of Activision Blizzard King. Anastasia’s active pro bono practice includes representing a class of plaintiffs in a lawsuit challenging abortion restrictions in Arizona, and a class of plaintiffs in a lawsuit against the Missouri Department of Corrections and its private medical provider, in which her team obtained a settlement providing access to life-saving medication for prisoners with hepatitis C. Before joining the firm, Anastasia was a law clerk to the Honorable Debra Ann Livingston of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and the Honorable Vince Chhabria of the United States District Court for the Northern District of California. She attended Harvard Law School, where she served as a Notes Editor for the Harvard Law Review.
Matthew has played a key role on the team defending Altria Group, Inc. against consumer protection claims pending in the Northern District of California related to Altria’s minority investment in JUUL Labs, Inc., and the team successfully defending Altria in an administrative trial stemming from the FTC’s challenge of Altria’s minority investment in JUUL Labs. He recently represented the Executive Council of the Habematolel Pomo of Upper Lake in a consumer class action filed in the Eastern District of Virginia in April 2019, where motions practice resulted in Plaintiffs dropping all claims for money damages against the Tribe’s economic development arms and the dismissal of Plaintiffs’ injunctive relief claim under RICO was affirmed by the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals. In his active pro bono practice, Matthew recently secured the compassionate release of an incarcerated client who had been in custody for twenty-nine years, since he was just seventeen years old. Before joining Wilkinson Stekloff, Matthew served as a law clerk to the Honorable Carolyn B. McHugh of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit and the Honorable Robert G. Doumar of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia. Matthew attended the University of Virginia School of Law, where he served on the Senior Editorial Board of the Virginia Law Review and was selected to mentor first-year law students in legal research and writing as a Hardy C. Dillard Writing Fellow.