Our Attorneys

Marisa K. Perry

Marisa Perry is a partner in the firm’s Chambers-ranked Construction Law Group. Marisa drafts, negotiates, and advises clients on construction, design, consulting, and project management agreements. Her litigation practice is focused on complex commercial disputes arising from construction and design agreements. She has significant experience handling a broad range of construction disputes in litigation, arbitration, and appeal across the country.

Marisa’s construction practice spans the full lifecycle of project disputes. Marisa is often consulted to draft and negotiate a wide range of agreements, including construction contracts, general conditions, design-build agreements, professional services agreements, subcontracts, and joint venture agreements. Marisa advises clients throughout their construction projects and is often consulted when issues arise regarding schedule, change orders, payments, and potential mechanic’s lien claims to minimize and mitigate risk to the project. Marisa has represented owners, developers, general contractors, and design professionals in disputes involving delayed project delivery, disruption and loss of productivity, change order disputes, contract interpretation, differing site conditions, scope disputes, termination, mechanic’s liens, payment and performance bonds, statutory violations, and professional liability. She regularly collaborates with and cross-examines technical experts on schedule, cost, and damages issues.

Prior to joining the Firm, Marisa was an equity partner at a nationally recognized construction firm, specializing in construction litigation and transactions on behalf of significant owner and general contractor clients. She also spent nearly a decade at a large litigation firm in their New York City and Chicago offices focused on complex commercial litigation.

• Secured a $50 million arbitration award on behalf of a major university healthcare system in an arbitration involving the windows of a new children’s hospital.
• Defended general contractor in a complex arbitration involving numerous change order claims on schedule and performance with significant expert analysis; secured relief on numerous fronts for force majeure delays and alleged performance issues.
• Successfully resolved a multi-million-dollar subcontractor claim against a major hospitality client relating to the construction of two hotels where significant construction defects and delays were at issue.
• Won summary judgment on all counts in a case brought by a subcontractor regarding breach of contract claims on a Chicago housing project.
• Successfully resolved a complex delay and construction defect case involving a hospitality developer on construction of a high-end hotel near entertainment venues.
• Handled numerous transactions on behalf of a senior living client relating to construction and maintenance issues at their facilities.
• Resolved complex disputes involving design contractors and general contractors working at a major supercomputing facility with a highly complex risk profile.
• Outside construction counsel for major law firm for construction transactions and projects across the country.

• Client Alert: Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Issues New Guidance for “Responsible Business Conduct” in connection with Enforcement Actions, July 29, 2013
• Protecting Confidential Legal Information: A Handbook for Analyzing Issues under the Attorney-Client Privilege and Work-Product Doctrine, Jenner & Block, 2012
• Update Team Leader, Protecting Confidential Legal Information: A Handbook for Analyzing Issues under the Attorney-Client Privilege and Work-Product Doctrine, Jenner & Block, 2011
• “The Burden of Proof Under CAFA: Removal and Remand,” Andrews Litigation Reporter, Thomson/West, Vol. 14, No. 4, May 2007
• “Attorneys’ Fees in Class Actions,” Illinois Institute of Continuing Education, Class Actions 2007 Edition, 2007
• Client Alert: Illinois Supreme Court Rules Class Action Not Permitted for Mass Tort Case, December 1, 2006
• “The NSA Domestic Surveillance Program: An Analysis of Congressional Oversight During an Era of One-Party Rule,” 40 U. Mich. J.L. Reform 149., Fall 2006

• Panelist, “Show Me the Money: The Effective Presentation of Damages in Arbitration Versus Litigation,” American Arbitration Association, April 22, 2015
• Panelist, “The Effective Presentation of Damages in Litigation,” ABA CLE Series, May 19, 2014
• “Effective Presentation of Damages in Litigation,” ABA Annual Meeting, August 11, 2013

Marisa has a vibrant criminal and civil pro bono practice, which has included representing individuals in federal and state courts. She argued and persuaded the Seventh Circuit to reverse summary judgment in a Section 1983 civil rights case on behalf of an inmate who was challenging the conditions of his confinement. Marisa led a complex RICO class action through settlement approval and appeal on behalf of rent controlled and rent regulated tenants who sued their landlord for forcing them out of their homes. Marisa also was part of a team that successfully appealed a 20-year conviction to the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals and she briefed and argued her client’s resentencing in the district court.