Judge Kathleen O’Malley (Ret.) is currently Of Counsel at Irell & Manella LLP where she focuses her practice on litigation consulting involving a broad range of subject matters, all forms of alternative dispute resolution, and intellectual property policy work. Prior to joining Irell, Judge O’Malley was a federal judge for more than 27 years, including most recently serving on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit after serving on the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Ohio since 1994. Judge O’Malley is the first former district court judge to be appointed to the Federal Circuit.
Preceding her judicial service, Judge O’Malley served as First Assistant and Chief of Staff to then-Ohio Attorney General Lee Fischer, supervising the office’s 1,100 employees, and, before that, as the Chief Counsel to the Attorney General, supervising the work of over 350 attorneys and litigating major matters on behalf of the State of Ohio and its elected officials. After her clerkship with the Honorable Nathaniel R. Jones, Judge O’Malley began her legal career litigating complex business cases at large law firms in Ohio. Judge O’Malley has also won numerous awards and honors, most of which are for the development of IP law.