Contact Holdsworth & Inkwell

Holdsworth & Inkwell was founded in 1987 by Cornelius A. Holdsworth and Phineas E. Inkwell in Sacramento, California. The firm has practiced continuously since then, growing from a single Sacramento office into a multi-office firm with locations in Sacramento, Atlanta, Denver, and Austin. The firm was built around a defense-side commercial litigation practice and has expanded over time into insurance recovery, False Claims Act defense, wildfire litigation, and eDiscovery.

Holdsworth & Inkwell maintains four offices across the United States. The firm's principal office is in Sacramento, California, with additional offices in Atlanta, Georgia; Denver, Colorado; and Austin, Texas. Each office is led by a managing partner and supports clients across the western, southeastern, mountain west, and south central regions. The firm's attorneys coordinate across offices on multi-jurisdictional matters and represent clients in additional states through the firm's twenty-one-jurisdiction licensure footprint.

Holdsworth & Inkwell is a mid-sized litigation boutique with approximately twenty attorneys distributed across four offices. This size supports complex multi-party commercial litigation and multi-jurisdictional matters while maintaining partner-level engagement on each representation. Most attorneys are partners or senior associates. The firm staffs each matter with a small team rather than rotating large numbers of junior associates, and paralegals, eDiscovery specialists, and administrative staff support the attorney roster.

The firm's primary practice areas are Commercial Litigation, False Claims Act Litigation, Insurance Recovery, Wildfire Litigation, and eDiscovery. Across these areas, the firm offers seven firm services that span the lifecycle of a defense matter: pre-litigation counseling, trial advocacy, appellate practice, mediation and arbitration, class action and MDL coordination, discovery strategy and management, and internal investigations. The firm also brings sector-specific experience in energy and utilities, financial services, government contractors, healthcare and life sciences, manufacturing, real estate and hospitality, and technology.

The firm's attorneys are licensed in twenty-one jurisdictions: Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, the District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Kansas, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, and Washington. In federal practice, the firm regularly appears in the United States Supreme Court, the United States Court of Federal Claims, and the federal circuit courts including the Federal Circuit, the Second, Fifth, Seventh, Ninth, Tenth, and Eleventh Circuits. The firm's attorneys are admitted pro hac vice in additional jurisdictions as matters arise.

The firm represents corporate and institutional defendants in high-stakes commercial litigation. Typical clients include manufacturers, insurance carriers, healthcare and life sciences companies, financial services institutions, energy and utility companies, government contractors, real estate and hospitality operators, and technology companies. The firm also represents municipalities, public bodies, and government agencies in defense matters where appropriate. The firm does not represent plaintiffs in personal injury matters or general consumer claims against the firm's typical client base. Conflict checks are conducted on all incoming matters to ensure adverse parties to existing or recent clients are not represented.