Mindy Sooter never knew a lawyer growing up, and might never have been one if not for a class she took pursuing her master’s degree in engineering at the University of Colorado.
“I was originally an engineer, and I never would have gone to law school, except that I would get a master’s in engineering at the University of Colorado, specializing in telecommunications, and they made you take policy classes,” said Sooter. “ And I loved the technology, I loved the computers, the telecommunications and networking, the electrical engineering, but I was dreading the policy classes, and eventually I had to take one to graduate.”
As fate would have it, Sooter met Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser through the class, who was teaching at the university at the time. Sooter said Weiser convinced her to take one of his classes in the law school, and she found it fascinating.
“I ended up falling in love with the telecommunication policy and regulation, in addition to the technology,” said Sooter. “So based on that, one thing led to another and I ended up in law school.”
After finishing law school, Sooter chose to stay in Colorado. Since there weren’t as many jobs in telecommunications regulation in Colorado as there would’ve been on the east coast, she decided to take a job litigating.
“I weighed a lot of options, and initially, when I graduated from law school, I had three kids. They were one, three and five,” said Sooter. “And I thought, ‘Oh, I can’t litigate with a family like this. It’s going to be too erratic, too demanding, too unpredictable, and I won’t be able to balance family and law.’ But then I realized that just about any discipline within law was going to be demanding, and so I decided to go back to what seemed the most fun to me, and that was litigation.”
Sooter added her family has been very supportive of her career, and they even tuned in to some of her hearings and trials during COVID.
Succeeding in High-Stakes Litigation
Currently serving as partner-in-charge of the firm’s Denver office, Sooter’s work at WilmerHale involves representing some of the biggest clients in the country. This year, Sooter and her team won a reversal for Intel amounting to over $2 billion in damages in its ongoing patent litigation with VLSI Technology, LLC, according to colleague Bruce Love’s nomination for Sooter’s Top Litigators profile.
Sooter said the cases have been going on for several years at this point, encompassing a number of trials relating to 23 patent assertions from VLSI against Intel. The assertions have been made in several different forums in the U.S. and China.
“So far, Intel has prevailed on 21 out of the 23 patents, and we are working through them one at a time,” said Sooter.
Another household name Sooter represents is Comcast. She said the cases she and her team represented Comcast on recently ended in a clean sweep of wins in its favor. Sooter noted that representing a client as big as Comcast can come with its own set of complications.
“They provide cable to a lot of people, they’re very well known, and so we have to really work with our trial strategy and our witnesses to put together a compelling narrative,” said Sooter. “And I think we’ve been successfully able to do that for them.”
In addition to these victories, Sooter led a WilmerHale team to a favorable settlement for Novelis, according to Love’s nomination.
Novelis was sued in November 2017 for allegedly misappropriating trade secrets related to the production of aluminum used in the Ford F-150. Arconic, Novelis’ chief competitor, alleged Novelis improperly disclosed Arconic’s secret information in a public patent application and claimed it was entitled to hundreds of millions of dollars in damages, according to Love.
After six years of litigation and antitrust counterclaims against Arconic, Sooter and the WilmerHale team succeeded in earning a favorable settlement for Novelis, according to Love.
Part-Lawyer, Part-Teacher, But Always Relatable
Sooter’s success in the courtroom comes down to a number of factors as complex as the law itself. Her father worked for the U.S. Army, and she moved all over when she was a kid.
“I had to make new friends all the time and be adaptable,” said Sooter. “And I do think that’s helped in my legal career, relating to juries, relating to people in different parts of the country and relating to people from different backgrounds.”
When she goes to trial, she works with the jury and sees what resonates with them.
“I try very, very hard not to oversimplify,” said Sooter. “You have to give the jury a lot of credit, because they are actually extremely perceptive and follow along with arguments quite well. But then also, you can’t talk over their heads when it comes to teaching complex technology.”
The technologies Sooter has explained to juries reads a lot like the course list for her engineering degree. She’s taught juries about all aspects of semiconductors, video streaming, cable technology, software apps, Wi-Fi and cellular standards.
“To me, the most fun part is teaching the jury what the patent is, how the technology works and either how they’re the same or different, depending on which side I’m representing,” said Sooter. “And when I’m representing a defendant, for example, who doesn’t infringe, it’s important to tell the story why.”
This combination of explaining the why and relating to and empathizing with the jury tends to resonate well, added Sooter. But another thing that keeps litigation exciting to Sooter is that there’s always room for improvement.
Aiding the Community
In addition to her work with WilmerHale, Sooter volunteers her legal talent. She said many of the pro bono cases she takes on relate to immigration. She’s helped unaccompanied minors gain their path to citizenship, and she said working with them has been very rewarding.
“Sometimes I feel like my mom instincts come out a little bit,” said Sooter. “You’re talking to them about going to school, the importance of staying in school, how to get along with their new guardians, and things like that. And there’s kind of just that unifying theme, it’s the same in all cultures, where the parents want to take care of their kids.”
Recently, Sooter and her team helped an Afghan family obtain their asylum. She said the family managed to make it on one of the last flights out of the country, but before they made the flight, they witnessed family members killed in front of them and endured beating before making it to the plane, and ultimately to the U.S.
“[The asylum process] took a long time because of the number of immigrants who are being processed, but the U.S. government did the right thing and gave them asylum,” said Sooter.
Sooter is working with several other clients at various stages in the asylum process. In addition to her work with immigrants, she and her team just filed a suit on behalf of a young transgender man who was denied gender-affirming care.
“That’s another case where we’re really trying to do the right thing and help somebody who’s unable to really enforce their own rights,” said Sooter.
She added that one of the most fun things about the pro bono and community cases, in addition to helping people, was the ability to supervise younger lawyers and help them grow their litigation skills.
Looking forward, Sooter said the continued wranglings between VLSI and Intel will remain a very active topic, and she’s waiting on an appellate decision in her work with Comcast. In addition, she’s looking forward to working with more pro bono clients and is excited about the future of the firm and its new chair Anjan Sahni.