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(HARTFORD, May 7, 2014) - Day Pitney partners Erick M. Sandler and Jonathan B. Tropp and director of diversity Asker A. Saeed have been elected as James W. Cooper Fellows by the Connecticut Bar Foundation (CBF). The James W. Cooper Fellows program honors the leading members of the legal profession and the Judiciary in Connecticut.
Mr. Sandler is chair of Day Pitney's appellate practice group and is a member of the Connecticut Bar Association's (CBA's) Appellate Advocacy Section's Executive Committee; its Litigation Section's Executive Committee; and its Federal Practice Section. He is a past recipient of the CBA's Pro Bono Award and was named in the Hartford Business Journal's 40 Under Forty and the Connecticut Law Tribune's New Leaders of the Law in 2012.
Mr. Tropp, a member of the firm's intellectual property group in Stamford, is a former member of the CBA's House of Delegates (2009-11). He also served as co-chair of the Federal Practice Section's Executive Committee, of which he has been a member since 2002. He has been a member of the Intellectual Property Section's Executive Committee since 2009. Mr. Tropp received the Anti-Defamation League Daniel R. Ginsberg Leadership Award in 2009 and has been recognized as an IP Star by Managing IP magazine (2013-2014).
Mr. Saeed serves on the Board of Directors of the CBF. He is a founding member, and former president, of the South Asian Bar Association of Connecticut. He is also a member of the Connecticut Hispanic Bar Association Advisory Committee; the New Jersey State Bar Association Diversity Committee: the Board of Directors of the Global Diversity and Inclusion Foundation, and the Tri-State Diversity Council. An American Bar Foundation Fellow, Mr. Saeed has recently been recognized as the South Asian Bar Association of Connecticut Member of the Year and the Connecticut Law Tribune "High Achiever" minority attorney.
The James W. Cooper Fellows nominate outstanding Connecticut lawyers, judges and teachers of law to become James W. Cooper Fellows. The CBF then extends invitations to nominees who have been selected by the Fellows Nominating Committee and approved by the Board of Directors. A number of Day Pitney attorneys belong to the Fellows Program.
The Fellows Program is named in honor of James W. Cooper, who was a prominent New Haven attorney and a senior partner of Tyler, Cooper & Alcorn. He served as president of the CBF from 1973 to 1975, the CBA from 1957 to 1958, and the New Haven County Bar Association from 1948 to 1949, and he was a Fellow of the American Bar Foundation. In 1982, Mr. Cooper was the recipient of the Charles J. Parker Award for distinguished contributions to legal services for the poor. Mr. Cooper left a generous bequest to the Foundation.
