South Carolina

Jodi Westbrook Flowers
Member

Jodi Flowers co-leads, along with Ron Motley, Motley Rice’s Anti-Terrorism and Human Rights practice group, the legal team that brought the groundbreaking complex litigation against the financiers and material supporters of al Qaeda. She represents thousands of family members and survivors of September 11, 2001, in a pioneering civil action to hold al Qaeda’s sponsors accountable and cut off the terror support pipeline, and serves on the Plaintiffs’ Executive Committee for In re Terrorist Attacks on September 11, 2001 consolidated by the Multidistrict Litigation Panel. She is an integral member of the Motley Rice aviation security litigation team seeking accountability and change in aviation security following the 9/11 attacks.

Jodi handles a variety of other anti-terrorism cases regarding the state-sponsorship of international terrorism as well as human rights litigation involving violations of international law and human rights abuses. Using her experience in complex case resolution, she served as the lead negotiator in the last hold-out of the individual cases against Libya for the Lockerbie bombing of Pan Am Flight 103. Additionally, she has worked on toxic environmental cases in the Virgin islands involving leaking gas tanks and is currently litigating cases involving individuals and businesses in Gulf Coast communities suffering as a result of the BP oil spill. 

Jodi’s legal career has included developing, researching and managing complex litigation and class actions on behalf of injured consumers and citizens in lawsuits and trials involving tobacco, asbestos, lead pigment, aviation, transportation and vehicle defects. She litigated against lead paint/pigment manufacturers, Bridgestone/Firestone for injuries caused by tire defects cases, and the telecom industry for wiretapping. She has served on numerous MDL Executive Committees and Subcommittees. Currently, she plays an active role in litigating multiple complex securities fraud cases and shareholder derivative suits. 

Jodi began her career applying restitution and fraud theories to the litigation against the tobacco industry which resulted in the historic Master Settlement Agreement between the state attorneys general and the tobacco industry. She developed expert and whistleblower testimony, synthesized millions of pages of documents and prepared the tobacco cases for trial. She prepared the false-marketing and child targeting case against the tobacco industry which resulted in restrictions on cartoon ads and the retirement of Joe Camel.

Jodi consults with various media outlets, including U.S. and foreign television, radio and print media. She provides pro bono work on a variety of global, national and community issues and helped establish the firm’s Charitable Contributions Committee. The inaugural edition of Benchmark Plaintiff, The Definitive Guide to America’s Leading Plaintiff Firms & Attorneys recently recognized Jodi as a "Local Litigation Star" in its national rankings for civil rights/human rights and mass torts/products liability, as well as its South Carolina rankings in environmental, human rights, mass tort and securities. She was also named to the 2010 edition of The Lawdragon™ 500 and is a member of the American Association for Justice, the South Carolina Association for Justice, the American Bar Association, the Charleston Bar Association and the Daughters of the American Revolution.