City of Indianapolis Legal Team Leader Matt Giffin Returns to Faegre Drinker

Faegre Drinker announced today that Matt Giffin has rejoined the firm as counsel in the business litigation practice group in Indianapolis, having previously worked as an associate at the firm from 2016-19. He joins from the City of Indianapolis where he served as corporation counsel in Mayor Joe Hogsett’s administration.

Giffin will represent clients in litigation and complex business disputes and adds to Faegre Drinker’s team of trial and appellate litigators which provides comprehensive on-the-ground litigation support wherever disputes involving clients may arise. In addition to his skills as a litigator, Giffin brings experience and strategic insights gained from his service as Indianapolis’s chief legal counsel and leader of its legal department.

“Matt’s extensive and distinct litigation experience in the private and public sectors really strengthens our team and will be a great benefit to our clients,” said Debbie Ellingboe, leader of the firm’s business litigation practice. “We are thrilled for his return to Faegre Drinker and look forward to seeing the contributions he will make to both the firm and our clients.”

As Indianapolis’s corporation counsel, Giffin led the consolidated city-county government’s legal department supervising the litigation and counseling divisions, and the office of the city prosecutor. Giffin contributed to the development of Indianapolis’s Community Justice Campus, fashioned interlocal agreements between city-county government entities, and negotiated collective bargaining agreements.

Giffin also handled critical aspects of the city’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic as well as federal grant compliance for economic relief programming as part of the CARES Act and the ARP Act. He served in Mayor Joe Hogsett’s administration for nearly five years, initially as the deputy director and legal counsel for the Office of Public Health and Safety, with responsibility for policy initiatives in areas including homelessness, food policy, violence reduction and offender re-entry.

Giffin was a litigation attorney in Faegre Drinker’s Indianapolis office for three years prior to taking his role in the Office of Corporation Counsel and previously was an attorney-advisor for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security in Washington, D.C.

Giffin earned his bachelor’s degree summa cum laude from Georgetown University and Juris Doctor cum laude from Harvard Law School.