Julian W. Poon is a partner and appellate and general commercial litigator resident in the Los Angeles office of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher. Prior to joining the Firm's Litigation Department, Mr. Poon served as a law clerk to Justice Antonin Scalia of the Supreme Court of the United States, and to Judge J. Michael Luttig, formerly of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit.

Mr. Poon has handled a broad range of cases at both the appellate and trial court level, in state and federal court. His first-chair appellate experience includes presenting oral argument to the Ninth, D.C., and Federal Circuits, and to California’s state appellate courts.

Recent appellate matters include securing a complete victory for a sporting-goods manufacturer from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, in a patent-infringement dispute; briefing and arguing an appeal concerning the existence of a settlement privilege, on behalf of a major energy provider, in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit; briefing and arguing a trademark appeal on behalf of a major automaker to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit; presenting oral argument to the California Court of Appeal and persuading that court to recognize that a will can have a non-testamentary, in praesenti effect; securing a precedent-setting decision from the Arkansas Supreme Court, on behalf of a major retailer, regarding the obligation of corporate officers and directors to disclose their own wrongdoing before they can enter into a retirement package or other self-dealing contract with the corporation; participating in securing, on behalf of a major insurer, a precedent-setting decision from the Ninth Circuit concerning the classification of claims adjusters for purposes of overtime-pay requirements; successfully representing an amicus curiae in a landmark U.S. Supreme Court case abrogating the presumption of market power from the mere possession of a patent, copyright, or other intellectual property right; and preparing amicus briefs, emergency stay petitions, and certiorari petitions to the U.S. Supreme Court.

First Amendment and media-access matters that Mr. Poon has handled include participating in the representation of a wide coalition of major media organizations in seeking public access to secret judicial proceedings and records in the California criminal case against Michael Jackson; successfully briefing and arguing motions to unseal sentencing records on behalf of The Wall Street Journal; and persuading an Arkansas court to recognize the protected status of a major retailer under New York Times v. Sullivan. Mr. Poon has also played a substantial role in a wide range of antitrust, trade regulation, intellectual property, class action, labor, energy, media-access, and general commercial matters, including participating in the successful representation of a major energy provider and its public-utility subsidiaries in the largest antitrust class action in California history and representing them in related litigation brought in other courts.

Mr. Poon graduated summa cum laude from Harvard Law School in 1999, and is the recipient of the Fay Diploma, awarded to the student with the highest grade-point average over all three years of the J.D. program. During law school, Mr. Poon served as a Note Editor of the Harvard Law Review, and was awarded the Sears Prize for placing at the top of his class in both his first and second years of study. He received his bachelor of arts degree with distinction and with honors, in Economics and in Public Policy, from Stanford University in 1996, where he was elected to Phi Beta Kappa.

Mr. Poon is admitted to practice law in the State of California. He is also admitted to practice before the U.S. Supreme Court, the U.S. Courts of Appeals for the Fifth, Ninth, Tenth, District of Columbia, and Federal Circuits, the U.S. District Courts for the Central, Northern, and Eastern Districts of California, as well as the U.S. Court of Federal Claims and the U.S. Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims. He has co-authored several articles, including “Willing to Settle? Think Twice,” in The National Law Journal (May 15, 2006), “Are Settlement Communications Protected from Discovery?” in INSIGHTS (Aug. 2006), “Illinois Tool Works Inc. v. Independent Ink Inc.: A Watershed Decision in Modern Competition Law and Intellectual Property Jurisprudence,” in Business Law International (Sept. 2006), “Supreme Court Reaffirms Narrow Scope of Primary Liability Under Section 10(b)” in INSIGHTS (Jan. 2008), as well as “United States v. AMR Corp.: The DOJ’s Failed Attempt to Impose a Competitive Straightjacket on Established Competitors,” in the January 2002 Antitrust Report. Mr. Poon received the Most Challenging Pro Bono Matter Award from the Firm’s Los Angeles Area Community Affairs Committee in 2005, and is a member of the Firm’s Hiring Committee. In 2008, Mr. Poon was named one of the "Top 20 Under 40" lawyers in California by the Daily Journal. He was also named a “Southern California Rising Star” in 2005, 2006, 2007, and 2008 by Law and Politics and Los Angeles magazines.