Joe Dougherty co-hosts The Law Firm of Saltz, Mongelluzi and Bendesky Show with lawyers from one of the most reputable personal injury law firms in the nation.
Since its founding in 1998, Saltz Mongeluzzi & Bendesky has developed a national reputation as one of the country’s most successful personal injury law firms. Led by partner and founder Bob Mongeluzzi, SMB has built upon its initial foundation as the leading Philadelphia firm for worksite injuries and medical malpractice to become a national powerhouse in construction and transportation accidents.
SMB is widely considered to be the go-to law firm in the U.S. for catastrophic construction accidents—particularly those involving building and worksite collapses, and incidents involving cranes and aerial lifts.
Over the last decade, it has also successfully handled several mass casualty events involving transportation, including the 2015 Amtrak train derailment in Philadelphia. Building on that experience, it is currently representing many of the plaintiffs in the 2018 Branson, Missouri duck boat disaster that claimed 17 lives.
With a roster of nationally-known practitioners and formidable financial resources, SMB has taken on some of the country’s most complex, technical, data, and document-intensive cases and won.
Lawrence Cohan’s practice focuses on toxic torts, chemical exposure, and mass tort cases. These include Asbestos, Benzene, Lead, Roundup, PFAS, other chemicals and other dangerous products. Larry’s practice also includes medical malpractice, pharmaceutical and medical device liability, class action, FELA, and other complex personal injury matters.
As a leader in many complex cases, Larry has forged new law in the trial and appellate court levels in Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Washington, D.C. Larry clerked early in his career for the Honorable Harry A. Takiff, helping the Court create the first asbestos mass tort program in the country in 1979. A few years later, he was lead plaintiff’s counsel when he worked with the Honorable George Kelton to create a similar program in Bucks County. Larry is presently on the Plaintiffs’ Steering Committee in the Federal Court PFAS Water Contamination MDL (multi-district litigation) in South Carolina and is co-chair of the water provider litigation committee. Larry was Plaintiffs’ Lead Counsel for the MDL on the infamous “human tissue” scandal case. He also served on the Plaintiffs’ Steering Committee for the Morcellator MDL in Kansas City, Kansas.
Larry has served for decades on boards of the Philadelphia and Pennsylvania Trial Lawyers Associations. He completed a term as president of the Philadelphia Trial Lawyers Association, the oldest and largest local trial lawyer association in the country.
Larry has represented literally thousands of steelworkers, many who worked at USX in Bucks County, Pennsylvania for claims arising out of their lung disease, including mesothelioma, caused by exposure to asbestos. He also regularly represents victims of exposure to benzene, many of whom worked at local refineries, who are suffering from various forms of leukemia. Larry has handled toxic tort and environmental claims against major chemical producers, including Rohm and Haas, Honeywell, and Dupont. He has represented many individuals suffering from variants of Non-Hodgins Lymphoma caused by their exposure to Monsanto’s Roundup weed killer.
He served as Lead Counsel in the first and only “market share” lead poisoning case filed in Pennsylvania against the lead pigment industry, and also represented victims of a recalled robotic surgical device and the potentially deadly uterine morcellators.
Larry has obtained multimillion-dollar jury verdicts in toxic tort and medical malpractice cases in Pennsylvania and New Jersey. He obtained the first plaintiff’s verdict in an asbestos case in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, with the first verdict of its kind against asbestos “friction” product defendants GE, GTE, and Eaton Cutler-Hammer Corporation. Larry obtained a $7.4 million jury verdict in a groundbreaking mesothelioma case. He also testified before the Pennsylvania State House against proposed asbestos legislation which would have denied victims rights.
Larry represents victims suffering from rare vaccine injuries before the United States Court of Federal Claims in Washington, D.C. as part of the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program, and has served on the Board of the Vaccine Injured Petitioners Bar Association. He is the co-chair of the American Association for Justice Vaccine Litigation Group. He has also lobbied with the Pennsylvania legislature on behalf of children injured by lead poisoning.
He is a Certified Trial Advocate with the National Board of Trial Advocacy (NBTA), which promotes excellence in legal advocacy as the first American Bar Association-accredited attorney board-certifying agency in the world. Larry is a New Jersey Certified Civil Trial Attorney. The New Jersey Supreme Court designates certified civil trial attorneys, a rare designation to only a few lawyers based upon documented experience litigating and trying complex civil cases before a jury.
Larry has been recognized among the “Top 10” in the state multiple times by Pennsylvania Super Lawyers. He was also named among the Top 100 Lawyers in Pennsylvania numerous times and has been included in both New Jersey and Pennsylvania Super Lawyers publications every year since 2004. Larry has just been recognized as the top medical malpractice attorney in Philadelphia by Best Lawyers.
Larry received his law degree from the University of Pennsylvania Law School in 1979, where he served for two years as President of the Law School Environmental Law Group. He graduated summa cum laude with a B.S. from Boston University in 1976. Larry also completed an internship with the Disciplinary Board of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania. Upon graduation, he served in a two-year judicial clerkship with the Philadelphia County Trial Court’s Honorable Harry A. Takiff, who founded the asbestos litigation mass tort program.
Larry frequently writes and lectures about toxic torts, chemical exposure cases, medical malpractice, pharmaceutical, and product liability, and mass torts on both local and national levels. He has lectured for many bar and trial lawyer associations, frequently serving as Chair of those conferences.
Joshua C. Cohan focuses his practice on litigating mass torts, environmental and toxic torts, and other catastrophic injury matters.
Joshua represents clients in mass torts and class action cases that have been catastrophically injured after being exposed to contaminants in the environment and after using dangerous pharmaceutical drugs, medical devices, and other products. Joshua has obtained successful results for his clients in In re: Testosterone Replacement Therapy Products Liability Litigation and is currently involved in the ongoing PFAS water contamination litigation In Re: Aqueous Film-Forming Foams Products Liability Litigation, in which he serves on two leadership committees. Joshua also successfully represented former NFL players in In Re: NFL Concussion Litigation.
In addition to the successful resolution of mass tort and class action cases, Joshua has successfully represented injured victims in a variety of personal injury matters, including, motor vehicle accidents, medical malpractice, premises liability, and products liability cases.
In 2010, Joshua earned his Bachelor of Business Administration with a concentration in Finance, magna cum laude, from The George Washington University. In 2013, he received his Juris Doctor degree from The Villanova University School of Law, where he excelled in legal research and writing as well as oral advocacy. He was a member of the Villanova Law Moot Court Team and was a quarterfinalist in the 52nd annual Honorable Theodore L. Reimel Moot Court Competition as well as a National Quarter Finalist in the 2012 National Entertainment Law Moot Court Competition where he was also awarded high honors for his competition brief.
While in law school, Joshua served as a judicial clerk to the Honorable Thomas P. Rogers of the Montgomery County Court of Common Pleas and as a law clerk at Anapol Weiss.
Joshua is a regular contributor to the Legal Intelligencer, having written articles on Medicaid Liens, Judicial Retirement Age Limits, Generic Drugs, Roundup Litigation, and on the ongoing PFAS Water Contamination Crisis. Joshua is also a contributing author to the 5th edition of the Library of Pennsylvania Personal Injury Forms and a contributing author to the latest edition of Pennsylvania Causes of Action.
Joshua has been named one of the best Mass Tort Lawyers in Pennsylvania in the 2019 and 2020 editions of the Best Lawyers publication and has been named to the 2019 and 2020 Pennsylvania Rising Stars list by Super Lawyers. He was also recently selected by the National Trial Lawyers as one of the Top 40 Under 40 Civil Plaintiff attorneys in Pennsylvania.
Joshua is a member of the Philadelphia Trial Lawyers Association, where he served on the Future Leaders Committee and the American Association for Justice. Joshua is licensed to practice law in Pennsylvania and New Jersey.