Championing David Over Goliath: Aimee Ferrer’s Passion for Advocacy at Grossman Roth Yaffa Cohen

Aimee Ferrer’s career as a trial lawyer may have shifted when she moved from federal to private practice last year, but her core purpose has never wavered: to serve those who need her help the most.

The daughter of two generations of nurses, Ferrer learned early that helping others was an important part of life. She became a lawyer to dedicate her life to service in a different way. She realized that goal from day one: Her legal career started by representing immigrant victims of domestic violence in family law litigation for a nonprofit in D.C. After a few years as a Big Law litigator at then-named Allen & Overy (now A&O Sherman) in New York, she came back home to Florida for a federal district court clerkship and then joined the Federal Public Defender’s Office in Miami.

Ferrer spent the next 14 years serving first as an Assistant Federal Public Defender (AFPD) and then as a Supervising AFPD in the Southern District of Florida, where she tried more than 30 federal jury trials to verdict – cases involving wire and financial fraud, cargo theft, money laundering, immigration claims and more. While an AFPD, she also argued in the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals and had three petitions for writ of certiorari granted to the Supreme Court – each of which resolved favorably for her clients.

Then, in 2023, Ferrer decided to transition to private practice – and over to the plaintiffs’ side. Her former colleague at the FPD, Alex Arteaga-Gomez, had moved to prominent plaintiffs’ personal injury and medical malpractice firm Grossman Roth Yaffa Cohen, and Ferrer saw the firm’s vision as clearly aligning with her own, while also providing the opportunities for learning, growth, and service that make her work fulfilling.

In the year and a half that she’s been with the firm, Ferrer has taken on hard-hitting cases; she is currently representing a woman who went permanently blind and lost her right eye after using contaminated eye drops. She is also on the team for the Allergan breast implant product liability MDL, which alleges an increased risk of developing anaplastic large cell lymphoma (BIA-ALCL), a rare form of cancer, among people who have received the implants.

In recent news, she and partner Gary Cohen secured a landmark $100M verdict against Dr. Berto Lopez, who was found liable for performing a botched circumcision that led to life-changing injuries for a young boy. The result is the largest of multiple cases Cohen has filed against Lopez over the last few years for patient injuries and deaths.

The connective tissue for these cases, Ferrer says, is the same as in her work at the FPD: “Our firm is particularly good at helping people who really need help,” she says.

Ferrer continues to embrace her ethos of service outside of the office, as well. She has been on the Miami-Dade County Human Rights Commission, a county board that handles employment and housing discrimination claims, since 2016. She is also on the board of a local nonprofit, Engage Miami, that focuses on civic engagement. And she is an active mentor: Ferrer volunteers with the Coral Gables High School mock trial team and teaches trial skills as an adjunct professor at the University of Miami in the litigation skills program, in NITA programs all over the county, and at Emory School of Law.

Because for Ferrer, service isn’t a buzzword. It’s a calling.

Lawdragon: Why were you first drawn to a legal career?

Aimee Ferrer: My sixth-grade yearbook says I want to be a lawyer. I think my mom instilled it in me very young that it was a career I'd be good at. The main thing that drew me as I got older was it seemed like an effective way to help people. I grew up in a real culture of service. My mom's a nurse. All my grandparents are nurses. It was the idea of serving and giving back, but in a way that dealt with less blood. I never wanted to be a doctor, but I was always leaning towards the law.

LD: Did you know what kind of law you wanted to practice?

AF: I never thought I was going to be a trial lawyer.

LD: Really?

AF: I went in to law school thinking I was going to do something more collaborative. I did not want to litigate. I did not want my day to involve contentiousness or fighting. I wanted to figure out a way to work in policy or some kind of more collaborative field of law that would help people get along. And then when I first got out of law school, I started in a fellowship at a nonprofit for immigrant victims of domestic violence and family court in D.C. When I started doing that, I realized that I loved litigating and I loved being in the courtroom, and that it was the most fun thing I could ever do. So that re-aimed my whole career trajectory.

LD: That’s amazing. How does that work influence what you do now?

AF: A lot of what I do today feels like a continuation of that. I got into this type of work because I like helping individuals, and I feel like our firm is particularly good at helping people who really need help. And then outside work, I also stay very active in the community. I try to keep that ethos of service as part of not just my work life, but my outside of work life.

LD: That’s great. And then coming back to your early career, tell me about what led you to the Federal Public Defender’s Office.

AF: Once I figured out that I wanted to litigate, I was supposed to go to Allen & Overy’s London office doing securities regulation. Then I realized that U.S. lawyers do not litigate in London. So, I called them and said, "Hey, can I start in New York instead? And could I join the litigation department?" And they said, "Absolutely." So I went there and soaked in a ton of great experience.

It was 2007, 2008. It was right when the mortgage crisis was happening. I dealt mainly with white-collar criminal defense as well as some SEC internal investigations and DOJ-related internal investigations. I got into the white-collar criminal law sphere very early; I was given great responsibility, and I worked with amazing partners there. Through that work, I realized that if I wanted to litigate, I should probably clerk. I then applied for clerkships here in Miami because this is home, and ended up clerking for Judge Huck, who is a wonderful human being and has been a wonderful mentor. I also do the Coral Gables mock trial coaching with Judge Huck. I have been very lucky in my career in that every opportunity and change I've made has been kind of serendipitous in a good way.

I got into this type of work because I like helping individuals, and I feel like our firm is particularly good at helping people who really need help.

Right before I left New York, I went to drinks with friends from A&O, and one of them brought a friend who was a federal public defender in the district of New Jersey. I did not know that federal public defenders existed. I asked her how she got the job, and she said, "Well, I clerked. At the end of my clerkship, I took out one of the AFPDs who was assigned to my judge's courtroom, and then I went from there." So, I was at my clerkship and there was an attorney who was an AFPD in Miami. He was assigned to Judge Huck's courtroom. I took him out to coffee, and I asked, "How do I get that job?" And he said, "Oh, we're hiring right now. You should run and apply because it closes in two days." And I did. I got the AFPD job. It was a dream job at that time in my life and I loved doing the work.

LD: And how does your time at the FPD relate to your practice now at Grossman Roth Yaffa Cohen?

AF: In so many ways. I was lucky enough to get to have a lot of great trial experience. And in many ways the representation of an individual who is in a time of crisis is very similar. It feels like a continuation of the type of work, but without as much trauma and difficulties as in the criminal system. In our cases, there's obviously been a lot of trauma, but at the time that we are litigating the case, a lot of the trauma has already happened and we're doing everything to make it better. It’s nice. It feels like a place where you could be really helpful.

LD: Looking at current matters, what is keeping you busy now?

AF: My practice since I've joined GRYC has straddled both the general liability and the class action MDLs as well as a good amount of medical malpractice. We have one case where our client is a young mom with three young children who went in for a tubal ligation done laparoscopically. It ended up causing amputated fingers, months in the hospital, and ongoing medical issues. It's terrible. So, that's a products liability and medical malpractice case, jointly. Then, I’ve joined the team on the breast implant MDL out of New Jersey. We're joined with Colson Hicks Eidson, and it's powerful because it's an all-female team. The paralegals are also women; the whole team is. The type of implants are mostly used in women who already had breast cancer. It is both a tragic case and interestingly complex. Things are moving forward there, which is exciting.

LD: That’s amazing. So, you came to the firm a little more than a year ago now. Tell me about that decision to come to the firm and how you've found it since.

AF: I have to credit my partner Alex [Arteaga-Gomez] because he and I worked together for a number of years at the FPD and we tried two or three cases together, at least. He is one of the smartest attorneys I know, and he is so hardworking. We remained friends after he left the FPD and I knew that he was really happy here at GRYC and he had nothing but wonderful things to say about his work and his colleagues and how supported he felt. That is what drew me to come here. It was really the ability to work, not just with Alex, but with a team that Alex vouched for.

I was interested in this type of law and knowing that I was at a place that did high-quality work and really took care of our clients and the people we work with was important to me when making that shift. The FPD is a very collaborative place, and it was nice to not lose that because that was one of the things I valued most about my workplace.

LD: What’s the change been like?

AF: I'm very happy here. It is a major career change. I am going mostly from federal court to state court, which is a big shift in practices and procedures. The access to justice and the ability to get a hearing and how quickly you get a hearing is different, as well. In federal court, your hearings will happen within a week or two of a motion being filed and you won't have to ask for it. It will just get set. And then you go in and you argue, and you have a decision pretty quickly. So, the length of time between motions being filed and being heard and the ways that it seems like it can be used to a party's advantage is concerning to me.

LD: You mentioned your work with the Human Rights Commission. What inspired you to get involved there?

AF: I was looking for more ways to serve. I love local government and politics, and I wanted to be of service, but not necessarily in a political way. We have this local county ordinance that is anti-discrimination on all types of protected classes. It's broader than federal law and it is also cheaper process-wise than bringing a court case. It's an easier process because most of the plaintiffs are unrepresented. And, when I was doing criminal work, it was a nice way to keep my foot in the civil world and keep that experience open while also experiencing the quasi-judicial board. You really do experience a little bit of what it feels like to be a judge and getting to bring in my experiences with representing individuals to that in the case where I'm not a party, I am an adjudicator.

It's a good reminder that sometimes the most important thing is the process being fair. Sometimes you have a pro se person who really just needs to be heard. It may turn out they don't have a basis in the law, but making sure that the process is fair, and they have an opportunity to be heard, can make their satisfaction with the outcome more likely.