Benedict P. Morelli

For over thirty-five years of trying cases, Mr. Morelli has received numerous multi-million dollar verdicts. In 1995, his $40 million verdict was featured in the National Law Journal as one of the “Top Ten Verdicts” in the United States.

He has tried every kind of civil case – from a person who tripped and fell over a raised door saddle and broke his hip ($2.6 million – the largest verdict in the country for that injury) to complex medical malpractice cases (the largest verdict in the country for blindness in one eye). He has attained the largest verdict for a loss of three fingers (medical malpractice) and the largest verdict for a crush injury to the arm.

In 2010, Mr. Morelli received a $22.5 million verdict in a polio vaccine case which had been filed thirty years earlier. This became the largest verdict in the history of the Supreme Court in Staten Island, NY, and was also the largest vaccine verdict in U.S. history.

In 2011, Mr. Morelli was lead counsel in a sexual harassment trial against a Fortune 500 company in the Federal Court in the Southern District of Illinois and received a $95 million verdict, which was the largest single-plaintiff sexual harassment verdict in the history of the United States.

In 2015, Mr. Morelli represented comedian and actor Tracy Morgan in his lawsuit against Wal-Mart when he sustained a serious traumatic brain injury in a tractor trailer accident that injured 5 people and killed one. 

In 2019, Mr. Morelli went up against Live Nation Worldwide in a labor law case in New York Supreme Court. The jury awarded Mr. Morelli and his client $102 million for injuries his client sustained when he was injured while working at the Jones Beach Theater.

Mr. Morelli and his staff are often trusted as trial counsel by other lawyers and law firms who choose Morelli Law Firm because of its track record for delivering multi-million dollar verdicts. Over the years, Mr. Morelli has always been considered a lawyer’s lawyer. He not only has numerous law firms referring clients to him, but also has judges recommending clients to him. From the time he was admitted to the Bar through the present, Mr. Morelli has been first and foremost a trial lawyer.

For two seasons, Mr. Morelli was a regular on the nationally syndicated television show “Power of Attorney.” He has also appeared as a guest on “The Today Show,” “Good Morning America,” “Aaron Brown,” “Anderson Cooper 360,” “Dateline NBC,” “The View,” “The Ananda Lewis Show,” and “Court TV.” Additionally, a five page feature article entitled “Benedict Morelli Feels Your Pain” was published in a 1999 edition of New York Magazine.

He has taught and lectured for the National Institute of Trial Advocacy, Association of Trial Lawyers of the City of New York, New York State Bar Association (“Proving Damages in a Civil Trial”), and the New York State Trial Lawyers Association (“New York Superstars,” “Trial Advocacy Workshop,” “Summations,” and “Cross-Examination”). Mr. Morelli was called upon to represent the plaintiff’s bar to counsel insurance executives on how to resolve cases.

Mr. Morelli and his firm has represented claimants in mass tort litigations including Chantix, Raptiva, Levaquin, Propecia, Yaz/Yasmin, Transvaginal Mesh, Fosamax femur fracture, DePuy hip replacement cases, and in the BP Oil Spill litigation. The firm also currently represents thousands of women who were diagnosed with ovarian cancer against Johnson & Johnson in the ongoing Talc litigation.

Mr. Morelli was selected as a member of the plaintiff’s steering committee of the MDL in the Avandia drug litigation, which was venued in the Eastern District Federal Court of Philadelphia. Furthermore, he was selected as lead trial counsel on one of the first two cases to be tried in that court.

In addition to trying cases, Mr. Morelli is a Past President of the New York State Trial Lawyers Association and is a member of the American Association for Justice, emeritus on the Board of Directors of the New York State Trial Lawyers Association, advocate rank in the American Board of Trial Advocates, member of the New York State Bar Association, American Bar Association, New York County Lawyer’s Association, National Employment Lawyers Association, and past president of the Brooklyn-Manhattan Trial Lawyers Association.

Mr. Morelli has been listed in Best Lawyers in America continuously from 1997 through the present edition. He has also been selected by the New York State Trial Lawyers Association as one of New York’s “Superstars.”