From Litigation to Arbitration to Funding: Paving a New Path in the Law with Ben Preziosi

Ben Preziosi describes his notable legal career as “hard to replicate.”

He’s right. Preziosi’s journey in the law has spanned more than four decades, five continents, two major career shifts and countless headline-dominating matters.

For 38 years, the renowned lawyer was a partner at global firm Curtis, Mallet-Prevost, Colt & Mosle. For the first 25 of those years, he litigated high-profile white-collar criminal cases and SEC investigations out of the firm’s New York office. As a young lawyer, he cut his teeth on cases arising out of the collapse of Drysdale Government Securities and the Ivan Boeskyinsider trading scandal. Then, in the ‘90s, he represented famed boxing promoter Don King in a host of cases, criminal and civil. Preziosi was also a key player in the representation of Arthur Andersen in high-profile matters involving the accounting firm’s engagements with WorldCom and Enron. In short, he handled some of the most hot-button, controversial issues of the time from day one.

In 2007, Preziosi made his first career shift: He focused his attention on the firm’s renowned international arbitration practice. He began by joining the firm’s team representing Venezuela in its oil industry nationalization cases and went on to represent many other countries – Spain, Ghana, India, Libya, Nigeria, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan, to name some. In one matter, he and partner Gabriela Alvarez-Avila led the team that obtained a significant win for Spain in 2020, when an ICSID ad hoc committee unanimously annulled a €128M award against Spain and ordered the opposing parties to cover the costs of the proceeding and Spain’s legal fees. That same year, he and his team achieved a complete dismissal in a $400M UNCITRAL investment treaty arbitration brought against India and won a $1.5B award from an ICC tribunal for Turmengaz against the National Iranian Gas Company. Preziosi even took off to the firm’s London office for a few years, heading the firm’s international arbitration practice in London beginning in 2017.

In 2021, Preziosi took an even greater turn: He moved out of practicing law and into funding it. He joined TRGP Capital, a prominent litigation finance firm headed by former litigators Michael Rozen and Hassan Murphy. As a managing director at the firm, Preziosi lends his significant legal expertise to dozens of cases at once, sourcing deals, leading portfolio selection and negotiating funding for high-profile legal matters.

Four years into this career shift, Preziosi’s varied, in-depth legal experience and discerning eye makes him a significant force in the litigation funding world – proving that unexpected paths can yield unprecedented results. He is a member of the Lawdragon 100 Global Leaders in Litigation Finance.

Lawdragon: What first brought you to a career in the law?

Ben Preziosi: I became a lawyer by default. I was the first person in my family to go to college. I went to Princeton and wasn't sure what I wanted to do. I took all of the tests: LSATs, GMATs. I got into Harvard Law School and then chose to go to law school.

LD: Did you have an idea of what sort of law you might want to practice?

BP: At that time in my life, lawyers to me were people who went into the courtroom, like Perry Mason. So, when I interviewed for a job, I asked one of the professors at Harvard what I should do if I want to become a trial lawyer. I was looking at criminal defense simply because again, that was kind of what I naively viewed as what lawyers do that is unique. He pointed me to Peter Fleming, Jr. at Curtis Mallet. Peter was one of the great shining lights of the criminal defense bar in New York and the United States as a whole. I interviewed. Peter said, "Why don't you come work with me?" I said, "Okay," and I stopped interviewing. I worked with Peter for 25 years.

LD: That’ll do it. Tell us about those early years. You worked on so many high-profile cases – are there one or two that stand out as particularly notable to you?

BP: Representing Don King and his company was a wonderful experience. Don is a very serious guy. When you saw him waving the flags and doing all his promotional stuff, that's his showman side. But he is a very, very serious human being. He was facing serious criminal charges. We think it was a targeted case. We tried it the first time around and there was a hung jury. The government made the grand mistake of superseding the indictment and indicting not just Don King, but also his company, which brought Billy Murphy from Baltimore – who's a famous, well-regarded lawyer – into the picture. Billy Murphy's son is Hassan Murphy.

LD: Right – your current partner at TRGP Capital.

BP: Hassan actually started at Curtis as an associate, and he eventually went and did miracles at his father's firm. What was already a successful firm in niche areas became a very successful firm in a broad variety of areas in part because of Hassan's stewardship, but also because of Billy's reputation and capabilities. Between us, we were a formidable team in the King case. We won that case and then we did a number of other cases together after that. But the King case was representative of one of the extraordinary things about the U.S. legal system. If you represent people who have the wherewithal to fight the charges, it becomes a somewhat more level playing field. When the government brings its resources to bear on a prosecution, it's very, very hard for people to withstand that. Don, of course, had the wherewithal, great fortitude and, frankly, great lawyers.

LD: Tell me about the next phase of your career.

BP: I continued to do civil and criminal cases, but in about 2007 I started doing international arbitrations. My firm had a long history in international work – both as transactional lawyers as well as in international litigation. We had been retained by Venezuela in connection with the nationalization of the country’s oil industry in 2007. Whereas most companies accepted the restructuring of their operations, the subsidiaries of Conoco-Phillips and Exxon did not and brought international arbitrations.

My partner, George Kahale, said, "I think we may need some help,” because these were really big, important cases, and while we had lots of good international lawyers, they were not used to putting big, complicated cases together. So, I came on. Ultimately, the representations were largely successful for both PDVSA and the government. The Conoco arbitration, interestingly, started in 2007 and just went to an annulment hearing last November. It took forever to get the case through the process. I was involved partially in writing the annulment papers before I left the firm, but then I was not involved thereafter, although I stay in touch with folks at Curtis. We're all good friends.

LD: And in 2017 you went to London to head up the international arbitration practice there?

BP: There were a couple of us there. I went to London because I was traveling to India and Africa all the time, and to Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan with some frequency. I was cutting eight hours out of the flight. Also, we wanted to have a bigger presence in London and Europe, so I was a natural fit. And it's always good having somebody from the mothership in an important office with important partners.

LD: That's such a shift from how your practice began.

BP: I've had one of those careers that it's hard to replicate. You probably can't replicate it today in most firms. But I was able to do it at Curtis because of the nature of the firm, which was relatively small with a number of high-powered lawyers who handled many different kinds of engagements. The lawyers at Curtis were really good. It's just we weren't big enough and we weren't inclined to get really big. I didn't become very specialized, so I did cases all over the place. I tried cases in 10 or so states in the United States, a number of federal courts, and then all of these international cases around the world. People don't really get to have that kind of diversity of practice much anymore. Some do, but not too many. I loved all aspects of it. Peter died in early 2009, and by then I was already doing the international arbitration work because that's where the real need at the firm was. And the fact of the matter is George Kahale and I made as good a team as Peter Fleming and I made. We had a great time.

LD: What was so successful about those partnerships, do you think?

BP: People who work hard and have a common goal and a modicum of talent are often successful at what they do. To work together, you have to enjoy being around each other, at least enough. And you have to have common goals and aspirations. There's nothing that we would not do to get the job done correctly and effectively, and that includes traveling to the ends of the Earth. When you have the same mindset, you appreciate the people you work with.

LD: How would you describe your style as a lawyer individually?

BP: If you ask anybody who knows me, they will tell you I don't get outworked. Of course I’ve made mistakes in my life. I'm human. But I'm very rarely surprised. As a lawyer, I usually understood and appreciated the other side's case and arguments, maybe better than they did in many cases. You prepare for the worst and hope for the best. I was tenacious and I was relatively talented. I could put a case together. I mean, I was a good lawyer. Did I consider myself a great lawyer? No, I didn't. I considered myself a very good lawyer.

There's nothing that we would not do to get the job done correctly and effectively, and that includes traveling to the ends of the Earth.

LD: What brought about your shift into litigation finance?

BP: I got Covid on March 31st of 2020. It was right at the beginning, and I was out of commission for about two and a half months. I was exhausted all the time. I was having difficulty passing the thoughts in my head through my mouth. So, I told my firm I didn't think I was able to do things the way I would need to do them and would like to do them going forward. I said I was retiring, and Hassan picked up on it somewhere along the way. And he basically said, "Don't do that. Come work with us." And that's what I did.

LD: How do you find your experience as a lawyer translates to your current role? I know there are a number of lawyers on the TRGP team.

BP: We have a wonderful team. Will [Zerhouni], aside from being generally knowledgeable, is a real wizard in the IP space. Eric Citron clerked for two Supreme Court judges. He is a great appellate lawyer. He also happens to be a world-class antitrust lawyer. David Killalea has a lot of insurance background, but he’s also like me in that he has more of a generalist background. And then Jeff Healy founded a law firm in Cleveland and represented large companies in defense matters.

LD: And where does your expertise fit in?

BP: A lot of people in litigation finance originally thought it would be compelling to invest in international arbitrations, particularly investor state cases. I have more experience than most people in that area. So I think I gave TRGP that dimension. I had also been in courts in different jurisdictions with local counsel; I've appeared in courts in the Netherlands, France, England, Germany, Malta and Switzerland over my career. I don't run away from the complexities of that, and I know people who can be of assistance in helping us wend our way through some of the complexities in those different jurisdictions.

LD: That’s great. And what do you enjoy doing outside the office? Any hobbies?

BP: I have two children who recently had children. We like to go to Cape Cod. I like to go fishing. But I don't have a lot of big-time hobbies. As my wife says, if I'm sitting around, "Why don't you go to work?" Instead of sitting around being nervous and thinking about work, "Why don't you just go do it?"