Peter Bensinger

Background

About Peter Bensinger

After 28 years of active practice since the firm's founding in 1993, Peter retired from the partnership and the firm's legal practice in January 2022. He now devotes his time to teaching and civic service. Peter was a nationally recognized pioneer in the use of legal technology in the courtroom, which led the American Lawyer to dub him "The Most Wired Lawyer in America." While he handled a wide variety of complex commercial cases, Peter had a focus in intellectual property and pharmaceutical antitrust. He was co-lead counsel for Bayer in the leading "reverse payment" patent antitrust case, In re Ciprofloxacin Hydrochloride Antitrust Litigation, in which Bayer prevailed in the Federal Courts. Before law school, Peter trained in improv at Chicago's Second City with founder Paul Sills and then was an actor in New York City with appearances on Saturday Night Live and All My Children. While an actor, Peter was called for jury duty on a cocaine conspiracy trial when his father was the head of the DEA. But the defense lawyer put him on the jury since he was an actor. Post-conviction, the judge debriefed the jury and encouraged Peter to go to law school, which he did at NYU. Following his associate training at Paul, Weiss in New York, Peter returned to his hometown of Chicago, where he became a featured performer in the Chicago Bar Association's annual musical satire, appearing as Mayor Richard M. Daley and as President Clinton in the year of the Monica Lewinsky scandal. For over 20 years at Bartlit Beck, Peter had responsibility for attorney professional development, performance reviews, and new lawyer orientation. He offered several unique CLE presentations:"Dealing with Jerks – using Aikido and active listening to deal with difficult opposing counsel" and "Presentation Stagecraft – using fundamental theatre techniques to enhance connection and persuasiveness". In fall 2019, 2021, 2022, and 2023 Peter taught an undergraduate seminar at Yale University entitled,"Leadership as Behavior: An Experiential Workshop to Practice Core Skills." In Spring 2021, 2022, and 2023, Peter taught a version of this seminar virtually at the University of Illinois College of Law. Then in Winter 2024, he taught Leadership as Behavior to undergraduates at Northwestern University. This fall, he is teaching a seminar at Georgetown Law School called,"Presentation Skills for Lawyers."