Overview
Bill Burke concentrates his practice on complex commercial litigation, professional liability defense, and investigations. He has successfully represented clients in federal and state courts, arbitrations, and federal regulatory proceedings throughout the United States.
Bill has extensive experience representing corporations and their officers and directors in contract disputes, fraud cases, class actions, securities litigation, shareholder derivative actions, and other types of complex civil litigation.
In the field of professional liability defense, he has defended major law firms in malpractice actions, grand jury investigations, and SEC investigations, has represented individual lawyers in ethics proceedings, and has defended state court judges in lawsuits asserting federal civil rights claims. He also serves as a member of Williams & Connolly’s Ethics Committee.
In addition to his litigation practice, Bill represents public companies, boards of directors, and audit committees in internal investigations regarding accounting issues, whistleblower complaints, insider trading, and alleged violations of the securities laws, the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, and the False Claims Act.
A member of the Bars of the District of Columbia, Virginia, and several federal courts, Bill has handled litigation and investigations in Alabama, Arizona, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Maryland, New York, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Texas, Utah, Virginia, Wisconsin, China, India, and the United Kingdom.
His pro bono work has included representing public-housing tenants in disputes with the D.C. Housing Authority in D.C. Superior Court; advising a non-profit whose mission is to advocate for military families; and advising a non-profit that provides legal assistance to foreign governments involved in peace negotiations, drafting constitutions, and prosecuting war criminals.
Bill was raised in Burke, Virginia. He graduated from Princeton University, where he was a Distinguished Military Graduate of the Air Force ROTC program, and earned his law degree at the University of Virginia School of Law. As a track and field athlete, he broke the four-minute mile, twice earned NCAA All-American honors, won a silver medal at the 1991 Pan American Games in Havana, won the 1993 U.S. National Championship, and was a member of the U.S. national team at two World Championship meets. After law school, Bill was a Captain and a judge advocate in the United States Air Force for five years, serving as both a prosecutor and a defense attorney in numerous courts-martial, and as a Special Assistant United States Attorney prosecuting crimes committed on base by civilians. In 2000, he joined Williams & Connolly, where he served on the firm’s Hiring Committee for three years, supervised the summer associate program for three years, and is a current member of the Ethics Committee. Bill lives in Arlington, Virginia with his wife and three children.