Mark is a regulatory trial lawyer and Managing Partner of Whitt Sturtevant LLP. He represents natural gas, electric, water, telecommunications and retail energy suppliers in regulatory commission proceedings and in state and federal trial and appellate courts. Mark is a recognized Advocate of the National Institute for Trial Advocacy, an Ohio Super Lawyer, and is listed in Best Lawyers in America. He was a partner at Jones Day and practice group leader at a litigation boutique before co-founding Whitt Sturtevant in 2012.
Mark has been involved in a number of significant regulatory proceedings, including federal and state court litigation stemming from the wholesale electric energy crisis of 2000; deregulation of the Ohio and Illinois retail electric markets; defending litigation against FirstEnergy arising from the August 2003 Blackout; alternative regulation of natural gas supply and distribution in Ohio; approval of accelerated infrastructure replacement programs; the implementation of performance-based ratemaking in Illinois; and electric rate disputes arising from the “polar vortex” of January 2014. His recent transactional experience includes the formation of the Blue Racer joint venture of Dominion and Caimen Energy, the acquisition of Cleveland Thermal by Corix, Aqua Ohio’s acquisition of Ohio-American Water, and regulatory counsel to the Clean Energy Future – Lordstown electric generation project. Mark has litigated numerous utility rate cases in Ohio, Illinois, Missouri, Kentucky, Oklahoma and Arkansas. As a civil litigator he represented Fortune 500 companies in state and federal courts throughout the country, as well as internationally. He has argued appeals at the Ohio Supreme Court, various intermediate appellate courts in Ohio and Illinois, and the U.S. Court of Appeals.
Mark is a graduate of the University of Akron (B.S., cum laude, 1993; J.D., cum laude, 1997) and a former Editor-in-Chief of the Akron Law Review. He is also a veteran of the United States Army (101st Airborne Division, 2nd Infantry Division, 11th Special Forces Group, 1987-1991)