By Timothy W. Martin
Lucy Fato had a reputation for being a problem solver before
becoming McGraw Hill Financial Inc.'s new general counsel last
summer.
Barely six months into her tenure the 48-year-old Ms. Fato has
already cleared a major legal headache for her new employer as lead
negotiator on a $1.5 billion settlement with the Justice Department
announced Tuesday.
McGraw Hill had traditionally been resistant to settling
government lawsuits. But on her first day as general counsel last
August, Ms. Fato phoned several government lawyers by 9:15 a.m.,
according to people familiar with the matter.
She stressed in those talks, the people said, that she liked to
make personal relationships to help resolve deals.
For outside counsel, she turned to a firm known for working with
banks to settle crisis-era lawsuits, Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP,
where she was a partner until 2005. In the crucial final two days
of meetings in Washington, Ms. Fato was flanked by Angela Burgess,
a Davis Polk partner who has worked on several Justice Department
cases.
She took the same conciliatory approach at her previous
employer, Marsh & McLennan, where she helped resolve several
high-profile government lawsuits, including one alleging price
fixing that was brought by former New York Attorney General Eliot
Spitzer.
Write to Timothy W. Martin at timothy.martin@wsj.com
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