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Practice Areas: Commercial Litigation; Appellate Practice; Personal Injury; White Collar Criminal Defense

Additional Information:

Steven D. Ecker practices in the areas of appellate litigation, personal injury litigation, professional discipline and liability law, and commercial litigation. In 2006, the Judicial Department of the State of Connecticut retained Mr. Ecker to represent the Judiciary in William J. Sullivan v. Andrew McDonald, et al., a lawsuit brought by former Chief Justice William J. Sullivan seeking to quash a subpoena issued by the co-chairmen of the Judiciary Committee of the Connecticut General Assembly. With Mr. Ecker as its attorney, the Judicial Department successfully intervened in the case to assert the Judiciary's claim that the Sullivan subpoena violated the constitutional separation of powers. The trial court adopted Mr. Ecker's arguments and quashed the subpoena on separation of powers grounds. Mr. Ecker also served as co-counsel for plaintiffs in Zeldes, et al. v. Rell, et al., the high-profile case challenging Governor Rell’s seizure of $2 million from the Judicial Department’s Client Security Fund.

Mr. Ecker has twice won the David H. Neiditz Award for the best-written appellate brief in the State of Connecticut. Mr. Ecker has successfully argued appeals in state and federal courts involving issues of constitutional law and civil rights, criminal law, civil forfeiture, employment law, personal injury law, professional malpractice, and domestic relations law. His appeals include Kelly v. Stop & Shop, the Connecticut Supreme Court decision fundamentally changing the law of premises liability in Connecticut; State v. McVeigh, the Connecticut Supreme Court decision establishing state law protection against unauthorized interception of cordless telephone communications; and State v. Morrissey, in which the Court rejected the "good faith" exception to the exclusionary rule on state constitutional grounds. Mr. Ecker has been selected for inclusion in The Best Lawyers in America (2006-2011) for his work as an appellate lawyer. Mr. Ecker was also selected as one of Connecticut's top 50 Connecticut "Super Lawyers" in Connecticut Magazine from 2006 through 2010.

At the trial level, Mr. Ecker has handled a wide variety of wrongful death and personal injury cases. He also represents business and individual clients in commercial litigation involving trade secrets, wrongful discharge, unfair trade practices, and a range of other business-related contract disputes, employment matters and commercial torts. Mr. Ecker also represents professionals in connection with professional liability, licensing and disciplinary matters.

Mr. Ecker is past Chairman of the Federal Practice Section of the Connecticut Bar Association and is a former member of the Grievance Committee of the U.S. District Court for the District of Connecticut. He is also a long-time member of the Board of Governors of the Connecticut Trial Lawyers Association, of the Connecticut Bar Association's Standing Committee on the Courts, and of the Connecticut Superior Court's Civil Division Task Force. Mr. Ecker is a member of the Connecticut Bar Foundation's James W. Cooper Fellows Program. In 2009, he was awarded the Connecticut Law Tribune's "Publisher's Award" for his role as plaintiffs' counsel in Zeldes v. Rell, the lawsuit successfully challenging then-Governor Rell's seizure of $2 million from the Judicial Department's Client Security Fund.

Mr. Ecker is a former law clerk to the Honorable Jon O. Newman of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. He graduated magna cum laude from Harvard Law School, where he was an editor of the Harvard Law Review and a member of the winning team in the 1987 Ames Moot Court Competition. He received his undergraduate degree, magna cum laude, from Yale College.