GABRIELLE SIGEL, Partner Publications · Professional Activities Chicago Office Office: (312) 923-2758 Fax: (312) 840-7758 Email: gsigel@jenner.com  Add to Outlook Contacts

Gabrielle Sigel is a partner in Jenner & Block’s Chicago office. She is Co-Chair of the Firm’s Climate and Clean Technology Law Practice, a founding member of the Firm’s Environmental, Energy and Natural Resources Law Practice and a member of the Environmental Litigation Practice. Ms. Sigel is the Editor of three of the Firm’s online resource centers, which provide regular reports on emerging legal issues: Climate Change Update, Asbestos Liability Update, and Environmental Cost Recovery & Lender Liability Update. Ms. Sigel is AV Peer Review Rated, Martindale-Hubbell’s highest peer recognition for ethical standards and legal ability, and has been awarded the Illinois Super Lawyers and Leading Lawyers distinctions.

Ms. Sigel’s national practice focuses primarily on environmental, climate change, and safety and health litigation matters. She regularly represents clients in complex environmental statutory, common law, Superfund enforcement, and cost recovery actions. For example, she successfully represented the City of Chicago at trial in a public nuisance claim relating to the expansion of O’Hare Airport. Ms. Sigel also recently appeared in a multi-week contested hearing concerning a proposed construction permit under the Clean Air Act. She has worked on several toxic tort lawsuits concerning contaminated sites located in residential areas. These environmental matters also involved multiple federal and state class and individual actions alleging cost recovery, personal injury and property damage which have been successfully resolved. The breadth of Ms. Sigel’s environmental safety and health, and toxic tort practice allows her to represent clients on all aspects of claims concerning release of or exposure to hazardous substances. Examples of some of those matters include defending at trial and settling a series of civil suits, including class actions, arising out of a chemical spill in an economically depressed residential neighborhood, defense of federal enforcement actions related to asbestos renovations, and insurance coverage litigation to recover the costs of remediating environmental sites and defending toxic tort claims. Ms. Sigel also regularly litigates, on behalf of policyholders, coverage claims relating to environmental and toxic tort matters.

As Co-Chair of the Firm’s Climate and Clean Technology practice, she is at the forefront of the most urgent and fast-breaking issues in this area. For example, she currently is advising a multinational corporation on how to address climate change issues, including working to develop definitions, inventory, and programs for greenhouse gas emission reduction. She also updates other multinational companies on the latest developments in this area. She regularly speaks at national conferences and publishes on climate change topics. In addition to her other publications, she is a principal author for the Environmental Law and Climate Change Center published by LexisNexis.

A significant portion of Ms. Sigel’s practice also involves representing employers in matters concerning work-related injuries and chemical exposures, including OSHA proceedings, personal injury lawsuits, criminal investigations, workers’ compensation hearings and insurance coverage claims. In OSHA proceedings, she has represented companies from food manufacturers to foundries and from farm equipment producers to foam cup manufacturers. In addition to administrative proceedings, her workplace injury practice includes defense of related civil and criminal actions. Her experience with claims arising from indoor air exposures have included defense of actions brought by workers and third parties, successful prosecution of insurance coverage claims for indoor air lawsuits, and counseling regarding the appropriate investigation of claims. Several of the toxic tort and indoor air matters Ms. Sigel handled were well-publicized and required careful planning and coordination of media and public relations.

In addition to her litigation practice, Ms. Sigel advises clients on a variety of counseling, regulatory, and transactional issues. On behalf of a Fortune 50 company, she developed a corporate safety and health oversight and compliance program for widely diverse operating subsidiaries. Ms. Sigel serves as a primary counsel on safety and health issues for several major corporations. Her transactional experience has included due diligence investigations of environmental, safety and health issues nationwide, in Europe, and in Canada, in preparation for both sales and acquisitions of manufacturing concerns.

Ms. Sigel has been an adjunct professor, teaching environmental law at Northwestern University School of Law. Prior to receiving her law degree, Ms. Sigel was a New York City Urban Fellow, working for two years in the New York City Mayor’s Office for Mayor Koch, addressing budgetary and legislative issues including education, housing and transportation.

Ms. Sigel is active in the American Bar Association, Sections of Litigation and Environment, Energy and Resources. The Illinois State Bar Association appointed her to its Environmental Law Section Council. Ms. Sigel also is very proud to have been a founder of the AIDS Legal Council of Chicago, a United Way-sponsored organization providing pro bono legal services to those affected by HIV and AIDS.

Ms. Sigel began developing her diverse legal practice when she joined the Firm in 1983, immediately after graduating cum laude from Boston University School of Law. Her undergraduate education was at Oberlin College, from which she graduated as a Senior Scholar in 1980. In 1985, Ms. Sigel took a leave from the Firm to serve as the first law clerk for the Hon. Frank H. Easterbrook on the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit. She is a member of the Illinois Bar and the bars of the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois and the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh and Fifth Circuits, as well as several state and federal courts on a pro hac vice basis.