Civil Litigation Update 2026

Justice Christine Donohue serves on the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania. Her term of office commenced in January 2016. Prior to her service as a Supreme Court Justice, Justice Donohue served on the Superior Court of Pennsylvania for eight years. As a lawyer, Justice Donohue was a civil trial lawyer and litigator for 27 years. She was a shareholder in the law firm, Buchanan Ingersoll & Rooney, P.C. and was the practice manager of the commercial litigation department in its predecessor firm, Klett Rooney Lieber & Schorling, P.C. She earned her Juris Doctor degree at the Duquesne University School of Law where she served on the Duquesne Law Review. While in practice, she held the AV rating from Martindale-Hubbell, she was listed in Best Lawyers in America, Pennsylvania Super Lawyers and the Top 50 Attorneys in Pittsburgh. She is an elected Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers, International Academy of Trial Lawyers, Academy of Trial Lawyers of Allegheny County and the American Board of Trial Advocates. She is a past president of the Western Pennsylvania Trial Lawyers Association. Justice Donohue is a former judge on the Pennsylvania Court of Judicial Discipline, a former chair and member of the Pennsylvania Board of Law Examiners and the Pennsylvania Judicial Conduct Board, and a former member of the Disciplinary Board of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania. Justice Donohue is a member of the American, Pennsylvania and Allegheny County Bar Associations. She served on the Board of Governors of the Allegheny County Bar Association and was also the Chair of its Young Lawyers Division. She is a member of the American Bar Foundation and a charter member of the Allegheny County Bar Foundation. She served as a member of the House of Delegates of the Pennsylvania Bar Association for two decades. She was twice recognized in Pennsylvania Law Weekly as one of Pennsylvania’s “Women Leaders in the Legal Profession.” Justice Donohue received the Distinguished Alumni Award from East Stroudsburg University in 2016. Justice Donohue received the Woman of the Year Award 2023, Duquesne Kline Women’s Law Association. She also received the Amen Corner’s 2023 Judge Robert E. Dauer Award For Judicial Leadership & Excellence. Justice Donohue spearheaded an effort by trial judges and lawyers to afford young lawyers opportunities to gain courtroom experience, especially presenting cases to civil juries. Bar groups developed a program known as Project LITIGATE encouraging law firms to take a pledge to give young lawyers opportunities to develop litigation skills while the Pennsylvania Conference of State Trial Judges endorsed Project LITIGATE and adopted a set of best practices for involving less experienced lawyers in civil jury cases. Justice Donohue taught ethics for attorneys at the Duquesne University School of Law. She has served on the Board of Directors of the Hill House Association, Make-A-Wish Foundation of Western Pennsylvania, Turtle Creek Valley Mental Health/Mental Retardation, Inc. and the National Aviary of Pittsburgh. She serves on the Advisory Board of the Duquesne University School of Law and is a frequent lecturer at seminars on the topics of appellate practice and judicial ethics. Justice Donohue’s chambers are in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. She resides in the city of Pittsburgh.

Melinda C. Ghilardi is an attorney at Munley Law personal injury attorneys.  Prior to joining the firm, she was the First Assistant Federal Public Defender, an Assistant Federal Public Defender as well as an Attorney/Investigator for the Federal Public Defender’s Office for the Middle District of Pennsylvania for 33 years until retirement in February 2019.  She began her legal career as an Assistant District Attorney in Lackawanna County. Melinda is Chair of the House of Delegates Committee on Credentials and Admissions, a Co-Vice Chair of the Pennsylvania Bar Association’s Federal Practice Committee and serves on the Executive Councils of the Civil Litigation Section and the Commission on Women in the Profession.  She is also on the Board of Directors of the PA Bar Foundation.  She served on the PBA Board of Governors as both the Woman Governor and Unit County Governor.  In that capacity, she was also a member of the PBA Nominating Committee. Melinda has also held the following positions in PBA Committees:  Co-Chair of the Commission on Women in the Profession, Chair of the Diversity Team, Co-Vice Chair of the DEI Team, and Co-Chair of the Bar Leadership Institute.  She is also a long-time member of the PBA House of Delegates. Melinda has been recognized as a Pennsylvania Super Lawyer from 2022 to the present as well as in Best Lawyers in America for 2024.  In 2005, she received the Lynette Norton Award presented by the PBA’s Commission on Women in the Profession. That same year, she received the inaugural Athena Award presented by the Greater Scranton Chamber of Commerce. In 2016, Melinda received the Robert J. Munley Distinguished Service Award from Lackawanna Pro Bono, Inc. Melinda is a member of the American Association for Justice, Pennsylvania Association for Justice, and the Melvin Belli Society.  She is the Treasurer of the Association of Women Lawyers of Lackawanna County.  She has also served as Secretary of the National Association of Federal Defenders and is a past President of the Lackawanna Bar Association. In her community, Melinda is a member of the Board of Directors of the Circle 200 Forum for Senior Level Executive Women and the Pennsylvania Coalition Against Domestic Violence (PCADV).  She also serves on the Legal Committee of the Barbara J. Hart Justice Center. The University of Scranton honored Melinda by establishing an Ignatian Scholarship in her name and, in 2000, presented her with the Frank J. O’Hara Distinguished Alumni Award for outstanding achievement in the field of law.  She is a current member of the Board of Visitors of the University’s Panuska College of Professional Studies. She is a 1976 graduate of Scranton Preparatory School and a 1980 magna cum laude graduate of the University of Scranton.  In 1983, she was awarded a juris doctor from the University of Pittsburgh School of Law.

Justice Daniel D. McCaffery is the proud son of Irish immigrant parents Seamus and Margaret McCaffery, from Belfast, Northern Ireland. McCaffery was born and raised in Philadelphia, and graduated from Father Judge High School. Upon graduation, he joined the United States Army, and served with the First Cavalry Division in Fort Hood, Texas as a cavalry scout. McCaffery was selected to attend the prestigious United States Mili­tary Academy at West Point Preparatory School. He received an Honorable Discharge and served three years with the Army Reserve, 304th Civil Affairs Unit. McCaffery attended Temple University, receiving his B.A in 1988 and Temple School of Law, receiving his JD. in 1991. Justice McCaffery served as an Assistant District Attorney in the Major Tri­als Unit of the Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office from 1991 to 1997. He joined Freidman, Schuman, P.C. in Montgomery County, PA in 1997. He became a partner in 2000 and eventually chaired the firm’s commercial litigation department and served on its management committee. McCaffery was elected to the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas in 2013 and assigned to the Major Trials Unit of the Criminal Division, presiding over several hundred jury trials, thousands of bench trials, and pre- and post -trial motions. He was elected to the Pennsylvania Superior Court in 2019 and elected to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court in 2023. Justice McCaffery remains actively involved in civic and community affairs including serving as board member to Self Help Drug and Alcohol Rehabili­tation, Inc. and volunteer to the Father Judge Board of Advisors and Coach of the Father Judge High School Rugby team. He is the proud father of two daughters: Madison Jenkins, a Philadelphia public school teacher and Maire­ad McCaffery, a recent Temple University graduate currently residing in New York working as a travel consultant.

Cate Rowe is a shareholder with the labor and employment law firm of Strokoff & Cowden, P.C. located in downtown Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. For over 10 years, Ms. Rowe has been practicing in Central Pennsylvania representing clients in state and federal courts and administrative agencies in a broad range of civil matters, including labor relations, workplace investigations, civil service, public employee retirement, discrimination, and professional licensure. She teaches Employment Law at Widener Law School and serves as the Immediate Past Chair of the Pennsylvania Bar Association’s Labor and Employment Law Section, Secretary of the Pennsylvania Bar Association’s Administrative Law Section, Immediate Past President of the Central Pennsylvania Labor and Employment Relations Association, and Treasurer of the James S. Bowman Inn of Court. In the Harrisburg community, Ms. Rowe is the Immediate Past Chair of the Harrisburg Community Council, and Parliamentarian of the Civic Club of Harrisburg. She sits as a school board member on the Harrisburg Catholic Elementary School Board and proudly volunteers with Lawyers Concerned for Lawyers and Junior Achievement. Ms. Rowe and her husband, Sean Kirkpatrick, Esq., live in Hershey with their daughter and two dogs, Nova and Archer.

Ms. Brougher is a staff attorney for PAR. She serves as the liaison to the Standard Forms Committee and Standard Forms Feedback Panels, and oversees the forms revision process for PAR’s library of more than 100 real estate forms. In addition, she is an attorney and a speaker, and travels across the commonwealth educating our members at the local level on legal issues and proper uses of the PAR forms. Desiree is a graduate of Indiana University of Pennsylvania and Widener University School of Law. Prior to joining PAR, Desiree spent seven years as a litigator in private practice. She currently lives in Hershey with her husband and two children.

Corrie Woods focuses his practice on post-trial and appellate litigation and provides support for Kline & Specter’s attorneys on a full range of legal issues. Woods joined the firm in 2025 after founding and practicing for seven years at a small appellate boutique firm in Allegheny County. Prior to that, Woods served as a judicial staff attorney to then Justice, now Chief Justice Debra Todd of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court and to Justice Arthur M. Recht of the First Judicial Circuit of West Virginia. Woods has frequently represented clients before the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, Superior Court, and Commonwealth Court, and trial courts throughout Pennsylvania. He has appeared before the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, Third Circuit, United States District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania, and the Superior Court of New Jersey, Appellate Division. He has litigated complex legal issues ranging from constitutional restrictions on redistricting, impeachments of public officials, and punitive damage awards to the proper interpretation of consumer protection, mental health, and various criminal and regulatory statutes. He has developed expertise in procedural and evidentiary issues in civil and criminal cases alike. Woods is an active member of the Allegheny County Bar Association, where he has served as the Chair of its Appellate Practice Committee since 2020, and he has also served on its Amicus Curiae Brief Committee, Judiciary Committee, Nominating Committee, and its Publications Committee. He routinely organizes and speaks at continuing legal education and continuing judicial education seminars on appellate practice issues. He regularly covers the Pennsylvania Supreme Court’s docket on his personal blog, SCOPABlog, and his personal podcast, The Standard of Review. Woods earned his undergraduate degree, summa cum laude, from West Liberty University in West Liberty, West Virginia. He received his J.D., magna cum laude, from the University of Pittsburgh School of Law, where he served as a Research Editor for the University of Pittsburgh Law Review and received awards for excellence in the areas of constitutional law and appellate practice.

Steve Loney joined the ACLU of Pennsylvania as Senior Supervising Attorney in January 2022. He is an experienced litigator, having practiced commercial litigation for 16 years at some of the world’s largest law firms. Before leaving private practice to pursue civil rights work full time, Steve was the Pro Bono Liaison Partner for Hogan Lovells’ Philadelphia office and the Group Manager for the firm’s award-winning Philadelphia Litigation Group. Steve’s public interest work prior to joining the ACLU included the first modern successful challenge to the Pennsylvania state legislative redistricting plan, an innovative petition on behalf of citizens impacted by gun violence challenging the state firearm preemption statute on Pennsylvania Constitutional grounds, and over a dozen successful disability claims on behalf of Philadelphians experiencing homelessness. Steve is also an active community volunteer, serving on the board of directors of the Church Farm School, the diverse financially accessible college preparatory school where he got his start. Steve earned his law degree from the New York University School of Law in 2004 and his undergraduate degree from St. Joseph’s University in Philadelphia. He also clerked for the Hon. Franklin Van Antwerpen on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit.

Yudelkys Rodríguez de Vargas is the founder and principal attorney of the Law Office of Yudelkys Rodriguez De Vargas LLC (YRV Law) in Allentown, Pennsylvania, where she maintains a solo practice focused on immigration and nationality law. Prior to founding her firm, she served as a Senior Staff Attorney with the Pennsylvania Immigration Resource Center’s Immigrant Survivors Project, representing survivors of domestic violence, sexual assault, and human trafficking. She serves on the Board of Directors of the Bar Association of Lehigh County and the Pennsylvania Coalition Against Domestic Violence, and is a member of the Pennsylvania Bar Association and the American Immigration Lawyers Association. Ms. Rodríguez de Vargas earned her Juris Doctor from the Dickinson School of Law of the Pennsylvania State University, where she received the National Association of Women Lawyers’ Outstanding Law Student Award and served as President of the Latinx Law Students Association. She began her legal studies at Universidad Autónoma de Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic. She received her Bachelor of Arts, cum laude, in Philosophy from John Jay College of Criminal Justice (CUNY). She is admitted to practice in Pennsylvania and before the Executive Office for Immigration Review, and is a native Spanish speaker.

Deborah is the Associate General Counsel at Cozen O’Connor. She advises clients on risk management, ethics, and professional responsibility issues arising within their law firms and practices. Deborah also works with stakeholders within the firm to advise on ethical aspects of pending matters and to assure adherence to ethical standards and compliance with firm policies. In addition, she advises firm management on lateral recruitment and integration. Deborah handles pro bono representations, including representing clients through the Support Center for Child Advocates. Deborah was appointed to the ABA Standing Committee on Public Protection in the Provision of Legal Services in 2023 and is Co-Chair of the ABA Section of Litigation Ethics and Professionalism Committee. Deborah was elected to the Pennsylvania Bar Association House of Delegates and is Vice Chair of the Pennsylvania Bar Association’s Legal Ethics and Professional Responsibility and a member of the Women in the Profession and Unauthorized Practice of Law Committees. In addition, she serves as Co-Chair of the Philadelphia Bar Association’s Professional Responsibility and Professional Guidance Committee. She is a lecturer in law and teaches a course in Professional Responsibility and Ethics at the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School. Deborah is also a regular columnist for Law360, where she shares her insights on current legal ethics issues. Deborah earned her bachelor’s degree, cum laude, from the University of Pennsylvania and her law degree from Columbia University School of Law.

Attorney Daniel J. Siegel is a nationally recognized authority on ethics, technology, data protection and business workflow management, and the principal of both the Law Offices of Daniel J. Siegel, LLC and Integrated Technology Services, LLC. Dan provides techno-ethics counsel to solo, small and mid-sized law firms on cybersecurity, technology and other related issues. His practice includes representing of attorneys in disciplinary matters; providing professional responsibility guidance to attorneys and firms; serving as appellate counsel; and representing individuals in workers’ compensation and personal injury matters. Dan also consults with law firms and businesses on workflow management, implementation of paperless offices, and other productivity matters. Attorney Siegel is a prolific speaker and author, and serves as the Chair of the Pennsylvania Bar Association Committee on Legal Ethics and Professional Responsibility, and Past-Chair of the American Bar Association’s Professional Development Board Chair. The author of 15 books, Dan is a columnist and frequent lecturer on a wide range of topics, including ethics, technology, substantive law, appellate law, and professional responsibility matters. You can reach Dan at [email protected].

Ms. Coatsworth is a partner at Margolis Edelstein. She has litigated hundreds of motor vehicle, dealer fraud and lemon law cases from both the plaintiff and defense sides. Additionally, she concentrates her practice in the defense of professionals such as realtors, home inspectors, accountants and physicians. She also has extensive experience with premises liability and product liability and has handled employment and construction work and several fraternity cases. Ms. Coatsworth has defended dozens of car dealerships and real estate sales people for claims of breach of contract and fraud and violations of various fraud-related statutes such as the Unfair Trade Practices Act, the Magnuson Moss Warranty Improvement Act, the Pennsylvania and New Jersey Lemon Laws, the New Vehicle Damage Disclosure Act, the Automotive Industry Trade Practices Act, the Real Estate Sellers Disclosure Law and the Real Estate Licensing and Registration Act. Additionally, Ms. Coatsworth specializes in representing Greek letter organizations in all manner of claims including dram shop, hazing, and personal injury. She was selected for inclusion in Pennsylvania Super Lawyers Rising Stars from 2011 through 2018 and Super Lawyers in 2021-2025. Ms. Coatsworth currently serves on the Board of Governors of the Philadelphia Bar Association as Immediate Past Chancellor, having previously served as Chancellor, Chancellor-Elect, Vice Chancellor, Assistant Treasurer, Secretary, Assistant Secretary, Parliamentarian and Elected Member. Additionally, she is a past co-chair of the Women in the Profession Committee, and she is also very active with the State Civil Litigation Section, Women’s Rights Committee, LGBTQ Rights Committee and the Real Property Section. She previously served on the Executive Committee of the Young Lawyers Division of that organization for six years and held the positions of Secretary and Vice Chair of the Division. She also served as a Trustee of the Philadelphia Bar Foundation and a Board Member for Philadelphia VIP. She serves on the Leadership Council of Community Legal Services and the Advisory Board for Pennsylvanians for Modern Courts. In the Pennsylvania Bar Association, Ms. Coatsworth is the Immediate Past Zone One Governor and she co-chairs the Membership Development Committee. She also serves as Vice Chair of the Civil and Equal Rights Committee and Large Firm Management Committee, and she sits on the Executive Counsel of the Civil Litigation Section as a Past Chair and the Women in the Profession Commission’s Executive Council as Co-Chair of the 2026 Fall Retreat. She previously served as co-chair of the PBA Women in the Profession Commission and chaired several of its committees including Annual Meeting, Fall Retreat and Awards Committee. She is also a Past Chancellor of the Louis D. Brandeis Law Society, and she serves on several committees of the Eastern District of Pennsylvania including the Community Outreach Committee and the Jury Diversity Task Force.