Asbestos exposure cases are winnable. What makes them so is having the facts — and justice — on your side. We almost always have both.

Frank M. Ortiz is a managing associate attorney in our Asbestos Litigation group who also from time to time enters the ring to fight for the rights of individuals harmed by defective pharmaceuticals and medical devices. During his lengthy law career, Mr. Ortiz twice shattered national records for highest dollar-award arising from an asbestos verdict, while a number of his other verdict awards — totaling multiple millions of dollars — came close.

He is particularly well-suited for the daunting work of bringing to justice those corporations that put profits first and the safety of employees and consumers lower on the list: between 1986 and 1989, Mr. Ortiz was a New York County assistant district attorney tasked with putting dangerous criminals behind bars. Weitz & Luxenberg added Mr. Ortiz to its asbestos team in 2008, attracting him from the plaintiffs’ law firm Russo, Scamardella and D'Amato where he had been employed since 2003.

For 14 years before that, he was with the law firm of Wilentz, Goldman & Spitzer — the work he did there, as at Russo, Scamardella and D'Amato, was similar in substance and scope to that which he does today.

Mr. Ortiz stays atop trends affecting his field through his participation in a trio of key legal organizations: the American Association for Justice, National Institute for Trial Advocacy, and New York State Trial Lawyers Assn.

Mr. Ortiz began the practice of law in 1986. Soon after, he expanded his geographic reach by gaining admission to the bar of neighboring New Jersey. Later still, Mr. Ortiz was admitted to represent clients in the New Jersey, eastern Pennsylvania and southern and eastern New York jurisdictions of U.S. District Court, as well as at the U.S. Supreme Court.

Mr. Ortiz graduated from New York Law School in 1986 with a juris doctor degree; during his final academic year there, he served as articles editor of that institution’s Journal of International and Comparative Law. In 1983, he earned a bachelor of arts degree from Rutgers College.