Riley H. Ross III is an associate in the Philadelphia office and concentrates his practice on complex litigation. Mr. Ross has extensive experience in the areas of corporate compliance, internal investigations, federal RICO claims, health care fraud, and civil rights litigation. Mr. Ross has represented a variety of clients, from a major health care provider accused of defrauding the federal government, to the City of Philadelphia and its employees facing a state grand jury and federal investigation, to quasi-governmental entities accused of due process violations.

Mr. Ross is an experienced trial lawyer having tried numerous cases in his previous position as an Assistant Federal Public Defender. During that time, Mr. Ross represented Derrick Kimbrough at the trial and appellate level and achieved the favorable sentence that was at issue in the landmark Supreme Court case, Kimbrough v. U.S., 128 S. Ct. 558 (2007). Kimbrough essentially eliminated the crack-powder cocaine sentencing disparity under the Federal Sentencing Guidelines and helped restore judicial discretion to federal sentencing. Most recently, Mr. Ross has represented colleges and universities in a variety of litigation matters ranging from employment discrimination to alleged civil rights violations.

A “2009 Lawyers on The Fast Track” recipient, Mr. Ross is an active member of the national, state and local legal communities. He was recently appointed by the U.S. Sentencing Commission to represent the Third Circuit as a voting member of the Practitioner’s Advisory Group – an advisory group to the Commission. Mr. Ross serves on the Board of Directors and is an active member of the Pennsylvania Innocence Project, an organization dedicated to securing the exoneration, release from imprisonment, and restoration to society of persons who are innocent and have been wrongly convicted. Mr. Ross is also an active member of the Pennsylvania Bar Association, the Pennsylvania Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and the Federal Bar Association’s Criminal Law Committee.

Mr. Ross received a B.S. in Psychology from Longwood College, a M.A. in Experimental Psychology from Western Kentucky University and a J.D. from the University of Virginia.

AREAS OF PRACTICE

• General Commercial Litigation
• White Collar Defense
• Corporate Investigations
• Personal Injury Litigation

ADMITTED TO PRACTICE

• State of Pennsylvania
• Commonwealth of Virginia
• District of Columbia
• Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals
• U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania
• U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia

EDUCATION

• J.D., University of Virginia, 1999
• M.A., Western Kentucky University, 1995
• B.S., Longwood College, 1993

PRIOR PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE

• Drinker Biddle & Reath LLP (Miller, Alfano & Raspanti, P.C.), Commercial Litigation Associate (2006-2009)
• Office of the Federal Public Defender, E.D. Va. (Norfolk)Assistant Federal Public Defender (2003-2006)
• Williams & Connolly LLP, Litigation Associate (2000-2003)
• United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Judicial Clerk (1999-2000)

PUBLISHED CASES AND SIGNIFICANT REPRESENTATIONS

• Represented defendants in civil RICO matters involving private investments in a mare leasing company;
• Member of a team that represented a large health care corporation in response to a U.S. Attorney’s Office investigation of alleged fraudulent billing of federal employees;
• Member of a team that represented the City of Philadelphia during federal and state investigations of a city organization and individually represented numerous city employees appearing before a state grand jury;
• Member of a team that represented a psychologist in his appeals of hundreds of denials of Medicare payments;
• Member of a team that represented an anesthesiologist during an investigation by the U.S. Attorney’s Office into his billing practices;
• Member of a team that represented law firm defendant in a civil matter alleging that the firm fraudulently induced corporate shareholders to invest in a ponzi scheme;
• Member of a team that represented large corporate defendant in a civil antitrust matter that followed the criminal prosecution of the corporation’s principals;
• Represented defendant in a criminal matter charging defendant with various gun and drug possession and distribution charges; achieved the favorable sentence that lead to the landmark case Kimbrough v. U.S., 128 S. Ct. 558 (2007) which essentially eliminated the crack-powder cocaine sentencing disparity under the Federal Sentencing Guidelines;
• Represented defendant in a criminal matter charging defendant with more than 20 bank robberies; obtained dismissal of all charges with prejudice on Constitutional grounds based on Government’s failure to produce evidence;
• Represented hundreds of defendants charged with a variety of criminal offenses ranging from embezzlement to identity theft to drug distribution to kidnapping;
• U.S. v. Carter, 349 F. Supp.2d 982 (E.D. Va. 2004). Represented the defendant in a criminal drug distribution matter. The Court held, as a matter of first impression, that the defendant’s prior conviction for hit and run under Virginia law was not a “crime of violence” for purposes of a Federal Sentencing Guidelines enhancement.

PROFESSIONAL PUBLICATIONS/PRESENTATIONS

• Riley H. Ross III & A. Kristina Littman, White-Collar Defendants Find Benefits in Supreme Court’s Sentencing Decisions, The Legal Intelligencer, May 23, 2008.
• Riley H. Ross III, The Effects of Race and Evidence on Jury Decision-Making in Sexual Harassment Cases (1995) (unpublished M.A. thesis, Western Kentucky University) (on file with Cravens Library, Western Kentucky University)
• 18th Annual National Seminar on the Federal Sentencing Guidelines, Federal Bar Association and The National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, May 21-22, 2009: Chapter 3: Adjustments
• Recent Developments in Federal Sentencing, Seminar by Office of the Federal Public Defender for CJA Panel Members, Fall 2005
• Recent Developments in Federal Sentencing, Seminar by Office of the Federal Public Defender for CJA Panel Members, Fall 2004
• The Annual National Seminar on the Federal Sentencing Guidelines, United States Sentencing Commission, June 16-18, 2010: Fraud and Theft Offenses
• • 19th Annual Federal Sentencing Guidelines Conference, Federal Bar Association and The National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, May 12-14, 2010: Guideline Departures & Variances Outside the Range Under § 3553(a)

PROFESSIONAL AND COMMUNITY INVOLVEMENT

• Practitioners Advisory Group to the United States Sentencing Commission, Third Circuit Representative (Oct. 2009 – present)
• Pennsylvania Innocence Project, Member of Board of Directors (Feb. 2009 – present)
• American Bar Association, Criminal Litigation Newsletter, Member of Editorial Board (May 2009 – present)
• Member of the Following Organizations:
• American Bar Association
• Pennsylvania Bar Association (Member of Minority Committee and Federal Practice Committee)
• Federal Bar Association
• National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers
• Pennsylvania Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers

AWARDS & RECOGNITION

• 2009 Lawyers on The Fast Track Recipient, sponsored by The Legal Intelligencer and Pennsylvania Law Weekly
• 2010 Pennsylvania Rising Star Recipient, sponsored by Super Lawyers, a Thomson Reuters Service