Jacob Buchdahl

Jacob W. Buchdahl is widely recognized as a leading trial lawyer. The Chambers USA 2024 Guide calls him “an exceptionally quick study of complicated cases” and praises his ability to understand “what will and won’t matter at trial.” The 2021 Edition notes “In court, he has command of the room and can tell a complex story in a simple, elegant way.” Lawdragon has named Buchdahl among the 500 Leading Lawyers in America for several years in a row, and he has been identified as a New York Super Lawyer every year since 2013.

A Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers, the preeminent organization of trial lawyers, Buchdahl represents both plaintiffs and defendants in commercial litigation across the United States. Buchdahl tries cases in every setting, from federal and state courts to AAA and FINRA arbitrations. Representative institutional clients include Third Point, Memorial Sloan Kettering, and NBCUniversal.

Before joining Susman Godfrey, Buchdahl was a federal prosecutor in the Public Corruption Unit of the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York. Buchdahl obtained the convictions of sixteen defendants after jury trials, including the former highest-ranking Russian at the United Nations on money-laundering charges.

Buchdahl is a graduate of Yale College and Yale Law School. He is married to Angela Warnick Buchdahl, the Senior Rabbi of Central Synagogue; they have three children and live in New York City. Buchdahl is a member of the Board of Directors of Lawyers for Children and served for fifteen years as a Trustee of the Abraham Joshua Heschel School.

Updated Oct 2025

• Won a $1.6 billion trial verdict in October 2024 for client BML Properties in New York’s Commercial Division on fraud and breach of contract claims arising out of the development of the Baha Mar resort. The judgment was affirmed in full on appeal by the First Department in April 2025.
  
  
• Secured a preliminary injunction for Saba Capital precluding a closed-end mutual fund from enforcing a bylaw enacted during a shareholder proxy contest. The bylaw substantially raised the voting threshold required to elect trustees, and the injunction allowed Saba Capital’s replacement slate of trustees to prevail.
  
  
• Won an appeal reversing a judgment against a subsidiary of NBC Universal after its insurance carrier refused to pay for relocation costs of a television series following a terrorist attack. After obtaining summary judgment on liability issues, the damages and bad faith portions of the case settled favorably on the eve of trial.
  
  
• Won a $6 million FINRA arbitration award against an algorithmic trading company on behalf of a former employee, based on breaches of the non-disparagement provision of his separation agreement.
  
  Won a jury trial in the Eastern District of Texas defeating patent infringement claims brought against a manufacturer of spinal implants.

• Appellate
• Arbitration
• Commercial
• Commercial disputes
• Competition/antitrust 
• Construction and real estate
• Dispute resolution
• Entertainment
• Intellectual property
• Plaintiff

• J.D. - Yale Law School    
• B.A. - Yale University    
• Law Clerk to the Honorable Charles S. Haight - Jr., United States District Court for the Southern District of New York - 1997-1998
• Law Clerk to the Honorable John M. Walker, Jr. - United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit    1998-1999

• Member of the Federal Bar Council

• New York