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David A. Westrup

Attorney

Photo of David A. Westrup

David A. Westrup

Attorney

  • Telephone

  • Fax

    (414) 238-6678

  • Email

  • Office

    Milwaukee
    411 East Wisconsin Avenue
    Suite 1000
    Milwaukee, WI 53202

David Westrup, a Shareholder and member of the firm’s Litigation and Risk Management Practice Group, provides trusted advice and innovative solutions to national and international manufacturers and commercial enterprises, focusing on protecting and advancing client interests in product liability, insurance and risk management, and antitrust. David works extensively with Fortune 500 management and legal departments, providing sophisticated insights to creatively address challenges posed by government agencies, competitors, collaborators, and the public. Examples of David’s imaginative representation of high-profile clients include defense of a national insurance company in Columbia Casualty Company v. Arjo Wiggins Appleton PLC, one of the largest and longest civil trials taken to verdict in Wisconsin, and United States v. Ajinomoto Co., Inc., a defense of a corporate executive in a federal antitrust prosecution alleging a global conspiracy to fix the price of lysine (this case is the focus of The Informant! – the Stephen Soderberg film starring Matt Damon).

David has repeatedly served as special counsel on U.S. law in overseas matters, including products liability and insurance matters before the House of Lords and the High Court of Australia, and has presented in London to insurance and risk management executives on specialized topics in U.S. law.

David teaches Advanced Business Law at Carroll University. He also routinely mentors litigation associates in pro bono engagements, and serves as a participant at law school trial advocacy programs.

He is a member of the Board of Directors for Latino Arts, Inc., a nonprofit organization dedicated to providing Hispanic cultural arts programming. 

David has authored a variety of articles on legal and law-related topics, including:

  • the historical roots of the right against self-incrimination;
  • procedural aspects of business torts and unfair competition claims;
  • diversity in the law;
  • extraterritorial application of the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) statute to civil claims;
  • health care and antitrust law;
  • twentieth-century art collector and New York attorney, John Quinn
  • the influence of translations; and
  • the Judge Dee Mysteries – a series of detective novels and stories, written by a twentieth-century Dutch diplomat named Robert van Gulik but set in seventh-century China.

  • University of Michigan, J.D., cum laude, 1989
  • Columbia College, Columbia University, A.B., 1984

  • Wisconsin
  • U.S. District Court, Eastern and Western Districts of Wisconsin
  • U.S. Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit
  • Ohio
  • U.S. District Court, Southern District of Ohio
  • U.S. Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit

  • Milwaukee Bar Association (past-President)
  • Wisconsin Hispanic Lawyers Association (past-President)
  • Hispanic National Bar Association
  • Seventh Circuit Bar Association
  • Defense Research Institute
  • American Bar Association (Antitrust Law Section; Tort Trial and Insurance Practice; Litigation Section)
  • Hispanic Professionals of Greater Milwaukee
  • Milwaukee Bar Association Foundation (former Board of Directors)

  • The Best Lawyers in America®, Commercial Litigation (2024-2025)
  • Wisconsin Law Foundation, Fellow
  • AV Preeminent® Peer Review Rated by Martindale-Hubbell®

  • Latino Arts, Inc., Board Secretary
  • Lawyers for Libraries, Charter Member