Phillips, John R., 1942-

<p>John R. Phillips (born December 15, 1942) is an American diplomat and attorney, and the former United States Ambassador to Italy and San Marino, serving from 2013 to 2017. As a partner at Phillips & Cohen, LLP (1988–2013) and before that, in Los Angeles, he practiced public interest law, specializing in whistleblower cases that recovered billions from companies defrauding the government.</p>

<p>Phillips was born and grew up in Leechburg, Pennsylvania, a small steel mill town in western Pennsylvania. His grandparents emigrated from Italy in the early 1900s. Their family name was Americanized and changed from "Filippi" to "Phillips."</p>

<p>Phillips received a B.A. degree from the University of Notre Dame in 1966 and a J.D. degree in 1969 from the University of California at Berkeley School of Law (Boalt Hall), where he was a member of the editorial board of the California Law Review.</p>

<p>Phillips joined the Los Angeles, California, law firm of O'Melveny & Myers as an associate in 1969. After two years, he left to start one of the first Ford Foundation-funded public interest law firms, the Center for Law in the Public Interest (CLIPI), in Los Angeles with three former colleagues.</p>

<p>Phillips was co-director of CLIPI for 17 years. During that time, the firm was a major force litigating landmark environmental, civil rights, consumer protection and corporate fraud and accountability cases. Some of its court cases include the following:<br>
Won consumer class actions suit against Toyota Motors resulting in a recall and repair of a brake problem in Toyota's first Camry model and consumer class action against Sprint for overcharging its customers.</p>

<p>Phillips played a significant role in the creation of the US government's whistleblower reward program designed to encourage private citizens to expose and stop fraud against the government. He worked closely with Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) and then-Rep. Howard Berman (D-CA) to secure congressional passage of the amended False Claims Act with "qui tam" (whistleblower) provisions which were signed into law by President Reagan in October 1986. The law has become the government's primary tool in holding accountable corporations that have defrauded the U.S. government.</p>

<p>Phillips started a private law practice, Phillips & Cohen LLP, in Los Angeles and later moved it to Washington, DC, and opened an office in San Francisco.</p>

<p>Shortly after passage of the amended False Claims Act, Phillips founded in 1986 Taxpayers Against Fraud, a non-profit group that is dedicated to educating the public about government whistleblower programs and advancing public and government support for whistleblower cases.</p>

<p>John Phillips was selected by President Bill Clinton to be a member of the President's Commission on White House Fellowships. He served from 1997 to 2001. In 2009, President Obama appointed Phillips to be the chairman of the President's Commission on White House Fellowships, where he served for four years. He was an appointed member (1988) to serve on the 9th Circuit Judicial Conference.</p>

<p>President Obama appointed him as US Ambassador to Italy and San Marino in 2013.</p>

<p>Phillips was a member of the Board of Trustees of the American Academy in Rome from 2009 to 2013. He rejoined the board in March 2017 after he stepped down as ambassador. Before he became ambassador to Italy, he made more than 50 trips to Italy in the previous decade and has made approximately 100 separate trips to Italy in his lifetime.</p>

<p>Phillips is married to Linda Douglass, a veteran journalist and communications strategist. They have a daughter.</p>

<p>John R. Phillips, a founding partner of Phillips & Cohen, is a nationally recognized authority on whistleblower cases.</p>

<p>Phillips has been called “the nation’s premier whistleblower attorney” by the Wall Street Journal and was recognized by the National Law Journal as one of the “100 Most Influential Lawyers in America.”</p>

<p>He also was named several times to Lawdragon’s “500 leading lawyers in America” list, which said, “Influential is the word for Phillips, who in guiding the top qui tam practice in the nation [Phillips & Cohen], has recovered billions under the False Claims Act.”</p>

<p>Mr. Phillips served for four years as the US Ambassador to Italy and the Republic of San Marino after being appointed by President Obama. He retired from the firm in 2013 to accept the ambassadorship appointment, then rejoined in 2017.</p>

<p>Mr. Phillips was a key architect of the modern-day False Claims Act, which gives whistleblowers a way to stop fraud against the government and be rewarded and protected for doing so. He worked closely with Congress to win bipartisan support for the measure.</p>

<p>Shortly after passage of the new law, he started a law firm, which is now Phillips & Cohen, that was the first one devoted exclusively to representing whistleblowers in “qui tam” cases brought under the False Claims Act. He helped build the firm’s practice so that it is now the pre-eminent law firm representing whistleblowers in cases under laws that reward and protect whistleblowers.</p>

<p>Among the numerous, significant whistleblower cases the firm brought during Mr. Phillips’ tenure were two against HCA, a for-profit hospital chain, that were a substantial part of settlements with the government totaling $1.7 billion, and a “qui tam” case against Wall Street billionaire Mario Gabelli and some of his associates that settled for $130 million.</p>

<p>Mr. Phillips is the founder of Taxpayers Against Fraud, a nonprofit, public interest organization that promotes the use whistleblower laws to fight government and corporate fraud, and serves on its board of directors.</p>

<p>He has a long history of involvement in public interest law. He earned his law degree from Berkeley Law (formerly Boalt Hall) at the University of California School of Law, where he was an editor of the California Law Review. He then joined the Los Angeles law firm of O’Melveny & Meyers as an associate.</p>

<p>In 1971, he co-founded the Center for Law in the Public Interest in Los Angeles, which focused on environmental, civil rights, corporate fraud and other issues. He served as its co-director for 17 years before starting his own firm to represent whistleblowers.</p>

<p>From 1988 to 1993, Mr. Phillips was an appointed member of the Ninth Circuit Judicial Conference. He was appointed in 1997 by President Clinton to the President’s Commission on White House Fellowships and was later appointed chair of the commission by President Obama, a position he held for four years.</p>

<p>In recognition of Mr. Phillips’ work with Congress to revitalize the False Claims Act and his success with qui tam lawsuits, Taxpayers Against Fraud awarded him its first Lifetime Achievement Award. The American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California also presented him with a Lifetime Achievement Award “for his remarkable work rooting out corporate corruption and his landmark agreements on behalf of the poor and the powerless.”</p>