Leslie King of Carlton Fields in Hartford/courtesy photo

Construction litigator Leslie King, who has scored a string of high-profile victories for Hartford in disputes involving the city's minor-league baseball stadium and Downtown North development, has made a lateral jump from Murtha Cullina in New Haven to Carlton Fields in Hartford.

Migrating from a partnership position at Murtha, King joins as a shareholder in the Carlton Fields construction practice, where she continues to represent Hartford with legal support for Dunkin' Donuts Park, home of the Hartford Yard Goats. Keeping the stadium and surrounding neighborhood projects—worth an estimated $200 million—healthy and on track is regarded by Hartford officials as vital to the city's economic future.

In an interview following "a whopping six days" on the new job, King acknowledged that court battles with ousted former contractors have been heated and ongoing, involving voluminous documents and five weeks of grueling court testimony. Nonetheless, King has been on a winning streak, garnering top headlines and lasting friends at City Hall.

The former New Britain Rock Cats, who were expected to begin their inaugural season as the Yard Goats in 2016, were delayed by highly publicized missteps, which forced the team to play its entire first season at away stadiums. As developers Centerplan and DoNo Hartford missed numerous construction deadlines and the project seemed to fall apart, a decision was made to fire the company.

King was brought in to work with Hartford Corporation Counsel Howard Rifkin and develop a solution to restart development of the stadium. "We were anticipating a huge, ugly lawsuit, of course, and that's when we got the surety to step in and finish the job," she said.

Getting straight to work, King helped Hartford obtain a guarantee from Arch Insurance to subsidize the development. In the meantime, she worked to relieve the city from liens placed on the surrounding properties by Centerplan, which also sued the city for wrongful termination, seeking $90 million in damages. Defeating that lawsuit became one of King's major victories.

A new company, Whiting-Turner Construction, was hired to build the baseball stadium. "Centerplan was supposed to finish work in March of 2016," King recalled. "It was a learning process, definitely, and the fact that Mayor [Luke] Bronin was so steadfast in his approach to this case made my job that much more clear. Normally in a case like this there's so much at stake that you try to bargain and settle, but we were convinced—and the mayor had our backs—that this was not the city's fault."

In a ruling last November, Judge Thomas G. Moukawsher offered sympathy and support for Hartford and its development plans, along with disdain for what he described as an apparent attempt by Centerplan to exact "a kind of revenge" on the city for firing the company. "Applying traditional measures, the court does not find the developers' chances of winning their appeal as being good," Moukawsher wrote, adding later, "Never mind that a jury rejected the developers' claims. Even if it had accepted them, the court has ample reason to anticipate that there is no reconciling these parties on even a superficial level."

With King's help, Dunkin' Donuts Park opened on time for opening day in 2017. The icing on the cake came when Dunkin' Donuts Park received the "Best Double-A Ballpark in America" award from Baseball Digest, which the stadium won again in 2018. King added that Downtown North neighborhood development plans are moving forward, including 200 new apartments, 11,000 square feet of retail and community space and a new 250-space parking garage.

In addition to her continued work on the stadium project, King said she brings experience representing design professionals, including architects, engineers and landscape designers. "I think it serves as a nice complement to what Carlton Fields already has going on," she said. "They just added a very good group of lawyers out of D.C., and it makes sense, if they're looking up here in the Northeast, to add me."

The firm's managing shareholder in Hartford, Frank Appicelli, agreed. "Leslie's clients have praised her as a tenacious trial lawyer and a skilled tactician," he said. "She is a significant strategic addition to our strong team serving our clients' construction and real estate needs."

Public relations manager Kate Barth added that King's addition to the team enhances the new group of construction attorneys in Washington. "Leslie is just part of the growing strategy of our construction group," she said. New hires have added "another dimension" to the practice, enabling construction clients to see the firm as a "one-stop shop" for everything from residential projects to government contracts. "We're just so excited to have Leslie at the firm," Barth said.

"Leslie is a skilled litigator with a track record of securing significant trial and appellate wins," said construction practice Chairman W. Cary Wright. "Her addition enhances our construction group's position at the top of the field and greatly complements our team's knowledge and depth to handle any construction issue."

King also noted that she serves on the board of trustees of Preservation Connecticut and is a member of the Grace Farms Foundation Architecture and Construction Working Group, which raises awareness about slave labor in construction supply chains around the world.

Back on the job, King said a team environment is "exactly what I was looking for. I feel really optimistic and excited to be part of such a robust team of construction lawyers who know every aspect of the law. It feels like the sky's the limit."