Eli S. Cohn

Eli S. Cohn was a distinguished trial lawyer in practice for more than fifty years.  Eli litigated hundreds of cases representing clients in the construction industry and as defense counsel representing attorneys and accountants.

Eli attended public schools in the Bronx graduating from the prestigious Bronx High School of Science in June 1948. He attended New York University where he majored in accounting and economics; and during his undergraduate years at NYU he worked for a Certified Public Accounting firm.  Upon graduating in 1952 he entered the army during the Korean war, was honorably discharged in August 1954, and returned to the accounting firm as a senior accountant servicing clients in the construction industry. He entered Brooklyn Law School to study law at night. Eli graduated law school in June 1958 and was admitted to the bar in December of that year.

Over the next five years the construction companies he serviced as an accountant became the nucleus of his legal practice.  He represented them in litigation involving disputes with contractors, municipal, state and federal agencies. In 1973 he merged his practice with a law firm that had similar clients. The firm became known as McDonough, Marcus Schneider & Cohn. The firm prospered in the ensuing ten years expanding to litigation in other fields of law. Mr. Cohn tried almost all of the cases up to 2008 when he became of counsel to that firm, then known as McDonough Law LLP. In 2012 he arranged a meeting with VLMM managing partner Chuck Lohrfink to explore the possibility of merging McDonough Law with VLMM. The merger became effective as of January 1, 2014.