Nicholas A. Bonaminio

Nick has experience assisting clients in a wide range of business disputes, internal investigations, criminal investigations and inquiries by both state and federal agencies, and public utility disputes. In addition to his litigation practice, Nick counsels companies regarding insurance coverage, energy and antitrust matters.

Prior to joining Calfee, Nick served for three years as an Assistant Prosecuting Attorney in the Criminal Division of the Lorain County Prosecutor’s Office. During his time as an Assistant Prosecuting Attorney, he gained experience as lead prosecutor on numerous criminal cases and managed a docket of more than 100 pending felony cases. Nick also served as a Summer Intern with the Lorain County Prosecutor’s Office (2016) and with the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Ohio (2015).

Nick earned his Juris Doctorate degree from Harvard Law School in 2017 and joined Calfee as an Associate in 2020.

Honors & Recognitions

• Best Lawyers: Ones to Watch, Commercial Litigation, and Insurance Law (2023-2025) and Litigation - Antitrust (2024-2025)
• Ohio Super Lawyers, Ohio Rising Stars, Business Litigation (2024-2025)

Education

J.D., Harvard Law School, 2017

B.A. in Economics, B.A. in Philosophy, magna cum laude, Case Western Reserve University, 2012

Experience

Representative Energy and Utilities Matters

• Calfee served as lead regulatory litigation counsel for an independent electric transmission holding company. Calfee represented the client in contested matters regarding a Petition for a Certificate of Convenience and Necessity to operate an electric transmission system and a complaint case associated with the CPCN.
• Calfee is providing direction on legal and regulatory strategy, draft filing, and pre-filed testimony and assisting in regulatory compliance and discovery processes for an independent organization that manages and administers significant energy markets in North America. Specifically, Calfee manages the stakeholder processes and presentations and assists with the client’s compliance with FERC Order No. 2222 directing RTOs to allow distributed energy resources (DER) to participate in wholesale electricity markets. This matter is of high importance to the client and involves FERC’s direction in Order No. 2222 and removes barriers to allow DERs to participate in wholesale markets, therefore expanding the grid to previously precluded resources. The rules developed through the stakeholder engagement and filings related to this FERC’s mandate will allow the expansion of wholesale market participation to aggregations of smart residential devices like thermostats and electric vehicle chargers.

Representative Business, Corporate, and Commercial Matters

• Calfee is representing a mutual health insurance company in several litigation matters, specifically: (1) a class action lawsuit challenging the client's practices in connection with "value-based contracting" with medical providers; (2) a class action lawsuit challenging the client's practices also in connection with "value-based contracting" by medical providers but with a larger putative class; (3) an action alleging the breach of our client's agreements with two national insurance providers.
• Calfee is serving as lead counsel to an American publicly traded, Fortune 1000, multinational company in a contract and trade secret dispute arising from a previous commercial relationship between the client and a manufacturer based in the Northwest U.S., involving one of the client’s products. The client filed a complaint against the defendant in United States District Court asserting claims for declaratory judgment and breach of implied duty of good faith and fair dealing. A few weeks later, the defendant filed its answer including counterclaims for breach of contract and misappropriation of trade secrets under state law. After discovery commenced, it became clear that the defendant had fraudulently induced and/or breached the contract in a myriad of respects resulting in the client amending its Complaint on two separate occasions to reflect the defendant’s wrongdoing.