Relman Colfax is pleased to announce that Lila Miller has joined the partnership.
Since joining the Firm in 2018, Lila has established herself as a leading fair housing and civil rights litigator, obtaining a number of victories and settlements in cases involving fair lending, housing discrimination, and police accountability. Lila was part of the trial team that obtained a significant jury award in Saint-Jean, et al. v. Emigrant Mortgage Co., et al., a reverse redlining suit against a New York bank that targeted African-American and Latino neighborhoods with predatory home refinance loans. In Kovari v. Brevard Extraditions, et al., Lila achieved a pivotal summary judgment ruling, in which the court held that three private prisoner transportation companies could be liable for plaintiff’s constitutional injuries because of their policies and practices. And earlier this year, Lila was part of the litigation team that secured a $53 million settlement agreement with Fannie Mae arising from its treatment of foreclosed properties. The settlement—one of the largest in the history of the Fair Housing Act—will direct millions of dollars in funds to promote homeownership, neighborhood stabilization, access to credit, property rehabilitation, and residential development across the nation.
Lila has also developed significant expertise in the area of organizational standing, authoring multiple amicus briefs on that topic in addition to addressing it in her own cases.
Currently, Lila is focusing on discrimination claims under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act. In Carroll et al. v. Walden University, she represents a class of Black and female students who were targeted for a predatory program by an online for-profit university. Lila will also be part of a trial team representing 35 plaintiffs in Drayton et al. v. McIntosh County, which alleges that the County is depriving Plaintiffs, Black and Gullah Geechee people, of basic municipal services in an effort to force them off Sapelo Island in violation of their Constitutional rights.
Lila graduated from Stanford Law School, where she was the recipient for the Deborah L. Rhode Public Interest Award. Prior to joining the firm, Lila served as a law clerk to Judge Jane Branstetter Stranch on the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit and for Judge Kevin H. Sharp on the United States District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee. She also previously spent two years litigating individual and class action employment discrimination cases for plaintiff-side firms.
Please join us in welcoming Lila to the partnership.