Olav Haazen, PhD, is a principal at Grant & Eisenhofer. His areas of practice include cross-border securities fraud and antitrust litigation.
Mr. Haazen has significant experience representing foreign and domestic plaintiffs in a variety of antitrust and fraud actions. Notably, he successfully represented a class of Fortis investors for whom he helped negotiate a record-high $1.5 billion settlement of all investment fraud claims in the Netherlands and Belgium. Other representations, past and present, include:
- nearly 300 institutional investors from around the world seeking recovery from Volkswagen in German court in connection with its well-publicized manipulation of emissions controls;
- a large group of Laiki and Bank of Cyprus bondholders and depositors with ICSID arbitration claims against Cyprus, whose interests were wiped as part of the 2013 Cyprus bank bail-out;
- foreign Madoff investors on fraud and negligence claims against feeder fund defendants and their auditors, custodians, and administrators;
- a French qui tam plaintiff in litigation arising out of the sale of Executive Life Insurance Company; and
- a large regional bakery in its successful monopolization suit against a competitor.
Mr. Haazen has also represented two classes of professional fashion models in price-fixing and consumer fraud actions, which resulted in a virtually unprecedented 100% recovery of all claimants’ losses, as well as substantial injunctive relief, which Justice Ramos of the New York Supreme Court lauded as a model for legislative reform.
Prior to joining G&E, Mr. Haazen was counsel at a prominent national law firm, where he successfully represented major corporate clients and individuals in several high-profile RICO, securities, and government investigation matters and commercial disputes, including a well-known playwright against a civil forfeiture claim arising out of Kenneth Starr’s “Ponzi” scheme; a utilities company in a significant contract dispute with Enron; and one of the largest franchisors in professional sports in a $1.2 billion monopolization suit. He has also represented several government entities and officials, including a Westchester County municipality in a $600 million lawsuit by Donald Trump’s Seven Springs LLC, as well as the City and Mayor of Amsterdam, and a foreign country’s former Secretary of State.
From 2010-2011, Mr. Haazen served on the American Bar Association’s seven-member Standing Committee for Amicus Curiae briefs and the Third-Party Litigation Funding Study Group. From 1996-2001, he served as a Country Reporter for the Netherlands for the European Restatement of Torts, and recently as a Netherlands Reporter to the 17th International Congress of Comparative Law. Mr. Haazen is a former professor of civil procedure and cross-border litigation at Leiden University in the Netherlands, and also previously taught at Harvard, Stanford, and Oxford. He has written several books and over 40 articles and case notes. He is admitted as solicitor in England and Wales, and as arbitrator at the Netherlands Arbitration Institute and at the Center for Dispute Resolution (CEDIRES) in Belgium.