3 New Intellectual Property Members for McDonald Hopkins

McDonald Hopkins LLC, a law firm with offices in Chicago, Cleveland, Columbus, Detroit, Miami, and West Palm Beach, just announced the election of three new intellectual property attorneys to the firm’s membership.

“Membership” is a form of ownership in an LLC, which is a limited liability company.  Increasingly law firms all across the country are opting to form as an LLC or some kind of professional limited liability company.  Therefore, largely gone are the days that one would become a “partner.”  Still, from the lay perspective “partnership” and “membership” roughly means the same thing.

The intellectual property attorneys being elevated to Member at McDonald Hopkins are:

• Todd A. Benni (West Palm Beach and Cleveland) – Member, Intellectual Property
• Joseph J. Crimaldi (Cleveland) – Member, Intellectual Property
• Scott M. Slaby (Cleveland) – Member, Intellectual Property

“It is a pleasure to congratulate these five talented attorneys who have already achieved much success at our firm,” said Carl. J. Grassi, president of McDonald Hopkins. “Our clients highly value their expertise and we appreciate their contributions to the growth of our firm.”

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Todd A. Benni (West Palm Beach and Cleveland) is an intellectual property attorney who has a wide range of experience advising both domestic and international clients. He helps clients obtain, manage and protect all types of intellectual property rights. Benni also has extensive experience providing legal advice and counseling to clients regarding advertising issues, such as CAN-SPAM, COPPA, sweepstakes, websites privacy policies, and terms of use of websites.  Before joining McDonald Hopkins, Benni served as senior managing counsel, IP, advertising and licensing for a leading global supplier of office products and services.

Benni has a J.D. from the University of Pittsburgh School of Law and a Bachelor of Science degree from Purdue University. He is the ambassador of the board of the Office Depot Foundation.

Joseph J. Crimaldi (Cleveland) is an intellectual property attorney who provides strategic planning and intellectual property asset management, both foreign and domestic, for start-ups, publicly traded companies and universities. He has prepared and prosecuted patent applications in a wide variety of technical areas and has drafted patent validity and infringement opinions in the areas of trademark prosecution and litigation.

Crimaldi has a J.D. from Cleveland-Marshall College of Law and a Bachelor of Science degree from Miami University.

Scott M. Slaby (Cleveland) is an intellectual property attorney who helps clients in domestic and foreign patent preparation and procurement in the chemical, biochemical and mechanical arts, as well as preparing legal opinions regarding patentability, validity and right to market. In addition, Slaby has experience with trademark prosecution and counseling, intellectual property due diligence and assists in patent, trademark, copyright, and trade secret litigation; licensing, and agreement matters.

Slaby has a J.D. from Cleveland-Marshall College of Law and graduated from John Carroll University with Master of Science and Bachelor of Science degrees. He serves on the Executive Committee of The Lawyers Guild of the Catholic Diocese of Cleveland Foundation.

About McDonald Hopkins

McDonald Hopkins has a more than 80-year history. The firm’s comprehensive services are provided by teams of specialized attorneys and professionals in areas such as business law, litigation, business restructuring and bankruptcy, estate planning, government affairs, healthcare, intellectual property, labor and employment, and mergers and acquisitions.