Frank Ortiz

New York, NY38 years experienceAdmitted 1987

About Frank Ortiz

Frank M. Ortiz serves as Of Counsel to Meirowitz & Wasserberg, LLP, advising on litigation with a particular emphasis on asbestos and toxic tort cases. He joined the firm in January 2024 after a career spanning more than 35 years in New York and New Jersey courts.

Mr. Ortiz began his legal career as an Assistant District Attorney in Manhattan from 1986 to 1989, including service as a prosecutor on the New York City Violent Predator Task Force. He then transitioned to civil practice, working as an associate and shareholder at a toxic tort firm from 1989 to 2003, then a boutique plaintiff's firm in Richmond County, New York from 2003 to 2008, and the largest plaintiff's toxic tort firm in New York from 2008 to 2016.

Over the course of his career, Mr. Ortiz has tried more than ten asbestos lawsuits and served as trial co-counsel on major asbestos consolidations including the Brooklyn Naval Shipyard Consolidation and the New York Powerhouse Consolidation. He has also submitted 77 applications to the September 11 Victim Compensation Fund and served as co-counsel on a prescription opioid mass tort consolidation.

Mr. Ortiz earned his undergraduate degree from Rutgers College in 1983 and his Juris Doctor from New York Law School in 1986. He is admitted to practice in New Jersey (1987) and New York (1988), as well as the U.S. District Courts for the Eastern and Southern Districts of New York, the District of New Jersey, the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, and the United States Supreme Court.

Proven verdicts and settlements at Meirowitz & Wasserberg, LLP

These results are credited to Meirowitz & Wasserberg, LLP. A result appears under an attorney's own name only when a published source names them as counsel on the case.

A Richland County jury unanimously awarded $32 million, including $10 million in punitive damages against Kraft Heinz, after finding that secondhand asbestos fibers carried home on work clothes caused Kathy Weist's fatal mesothelioma diagnosis.

South Carolina Court of Common Pleas, 5th Judicial Circuit, Richland County (No. 2020-CP-40-02597) · 2021Wrongful DeathRead the full story →
$23.6 millionVerdictTop 20 in Massachusetts · #14

A Boston jury found on Sept. 13, 2024 that Cimbar Performance Minerals misrepresented the safety of its Elite Talc 2000 and that its negligence helped cause a Utah man's mesothelioma, which was diagnosed seven years after he received talc during a 2014 pleurodesis. It is the first known verdict on that theory. The jury awarded about $39.1 million, and the trial judge later cut the future pain and suffering item from $21.5 million to $6 million. About $23.6 million stood.

Massachusetts Superior Court, Boston · 2024Product LiabilityRead the full story →

Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome. Each case is unique and depends on its own facts.

Practice areas

Education

New York Law School
JD, 1986
Rutgers College
Undergraduate, 1983

Bar admissions & credentials

State Bar of NJ, admitted 1987
State Bar of NY, admitted 1988

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Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome. Each case is unique and depends on its own facts.