Special Master/Discovery Referee
Hon. Kathleen A. Roberts (Ret.) served as a United States Magistrate Judge in the Southern District of New York from 1985 to 1995 where she presided over trials, supervised discovery, and conducted settlement conferences in thousands of commercial, employment, insurance, securities, intellectual property, product liability, environmental, and civil rights cases. Since joining JAMS in 1995, Judge Roberts has been appointed by state and federal courts as a special master, monitor and discovery referee in a number of complex commercial, product liability, insurance, intellectual property, and employment cases.
Judge Roberts is an Adjunct Professor at New York University School of Law, where she teaches negotiation, mediation and arbitration as part of a semester-long course on Alternative Dispute Resolution. Judge Roberts frequently speaks to bar associations and other professional groups and teaches continuing legal education courses regarding Alternative Dispute Resolution.
Representative Matters
- Appointed in 2010 by the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York and currently serving as a Monitor and Interim Trustee for a 36-story commercial retail and office building on Fifth Avenue that is the subject of forfeiture proceedings brought by the United States
- Appointed by the U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado as a consultant to monitor a four-year consent decree involving promotion of women at a national restaurant chain
- Appointed by the Supreme Court, New York County, to adjudicate privilege claims in a complex securities dispute between an international bank and its customer
- Appointed by the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York as an election monitor for unions under court supervision
- Appointed by U.S. District Courts for the Southern District of New York and the District of Columbia to adjudicate privilege claims in two telecommunications patent cases
- Appointed by the Supreme Court, Nassau County, to supervise discovery in cases consolidated from state and federal courts involving the liquidation of an insurance company
- Appointed by the Supreme Court, New York County, to resolve discovery disputes in a product liability action involving the drug Serzone
- Appointed by the Supreme Court, New York County, to supervise discovery in a case brought by the City of New York against manufacturers of lead pigment, seeking damages for lead paint abatement in numerous public housing projects
