Dante A. Stella Member

Dante Stella is a senior litigator trusted by clients and colleagues to plan and execute responses to complicated or high-risk matters that either involve data of an extensive or sensitive nature (like class actions, major commercial litigation, and responses to government investigations) or are about data, such as coordinating responses to security incidents and data breaches, evaluating and negotiating supply chain relationships that involve the handling of confidential or sensitive data, or helping enterprises improve their information lifecycle management and readiness for major legal events.

Mr. Stella leads Dykema's Discovery Management and E-Discovery Group, a cross-disciplinary and solution-oriented team of attorneys, legal specialists, and legal technologists.

Mr. Stella is also a member of Dykema's Pro Bono Committee, representing the Detroit office.

Litigation and Investigations

Having been a litigator for more than two decades, Mr. Stella has handled a wide variety of cases for clients who are manufacturers (both general and automotive), retailers, banks and other financial institutions, insurance companies, and owners of closely held businesses. These matters have spanned almost every area of litigation, both named plaintiff and class actions, including:

• Antitrust litigation
• Manufacturing-related litigation (products liability, warranty cost recovery)
• Business torts (fraud, trade secrets, consumer protection)
• Financial services litigation (such as higher exposure TILA, FDCPA, FCRA and TCPA matters)

Mr. Stella's investigative work (for internal and external investigations) includes planning, coordinating, and executing compliant and cost-effective responses to criminal and regulatory investigations by the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) Antitrust Division, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC); the Office of the Inspector General (OIG); the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI); and state authorities. His skills in this area include:

• Data preservation procedures
• Initial assessments of information sought
• Negotiation over scope of information and document productions
• Witness interviews and surveys of data sources
• Compliant analytics, review, and production of data

Data Privacy and Security

Mr. Stella is a member of Dykema’s Data Privacy and Security Group and is co-editor of the firm’s Firewall data privacy and security blog.

Leveraging his long experience with litigating contractual disputes, Mr. Stella assists numerous clients with the negotiation of contracts (both upstream and downstream) where the mishandling of personal information, protected health information, or commercially-sensitive information could generate significant first- or third-party liability.

He also applies his experience in crisis and vendor management to assist clients in assessing and remediating data security incidents, both to solve immediate problems and minimize long-term litigation and other risk.

Finally, Mr. Stella applies data privacy principles to the design of E-Discovery projects so that cases of a completely commercial nature do not unexpectedly spawn liability from violations of data privacy laws.

E-Discovery Design, Compliance, and Defense

In his role with Dykema's E-Discovery and Discovery Management Group, Mr. Stella's specialized projects have covered all aspects of the field in a variety of industries, including manufacturing, banking, insurance, health care, energy, construction, and services. Active for nearly two decades in the field, he assists clients with:

• Compliant, efficient, and cost-effective methods for preserving, processing, reviewing, and producing data in litigation
• Negotiation of E-Discovery protocols and related motions
• Training client personnel on “peacetime” activities such as information lifecycle management, deployment of in-house E-Discovery systems, and structuring discovery activities.

Mr. Stella is also available as a mediator or special master for E-Discovery disputes. His extensive knowledge of E-Discovery processes and attendant cost issues makes him well-suited to fashion reasoned, realistic solutions to the sharp disagreements that can arise in this field.

Prior to joining Dykema, Mr. Stella interned for the Honorable Avern Cohn, United States District Judge for the Eastern District of Michigan.