Overview
Hans Riede counsels corporations as well as a diverse assortment of industry leaders and executives on a wide variety of employment disputes, providing detailed analyses of all potential risks and opportunities should clients choose to pursue litigation, including high-stakes bet-the-company litigation, or alternative dispute resolution.
Combining business, financial, and legal insights with a strong track record in the courtroom, Hans offers comprehensive, experience-backed solutions favorable to clients’ bottom lines. His extensive trial experience has spanned trade secrets and defamation cases, class actions and collective actions, noncompete agreements and executive compensation contracts, shareholder derivative lawsuits, and general employment litigation. In addition to business clients, he regularly represents law firms, AmLaw 100 attorneys, doctors, and sports professionals, including a Hall of Fame NBA coach.
As a dedicated advisor, Hans also provides guidance on how to prevent litigation when potential risks or costs exceed desired outcomes. His preference for financial safeguarding is supported by his role as a testifying attorneys’ fees expert, in which he reviews and provides an opinion on legal fees, billing practices, and fee agreements in contested cases to ensure reasonableness and accuracy.
Hans is notably conversational in Spanish, which he uses to support a diverse client base.
Credentials
Education
- University of Richmond School of Law, 2007 (J.D.)
- University of Virginia, 2002 (B.S.)
Court Admissions
- U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit
- U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit
- U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia
- U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia
- U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland
- Served as lead attorney and first-chair trial counsel for commodities brokerage firm in its successful defense of a multimillion-dollar trade secrets, tort, and business conspiracy lawsuit.
- Served as lead attorney and first-chair trial counsel for a health care consulting firm in its successful defense of a multi-six-figure breach of contract lawsuit brought by a former executive.
- Served as lead counsel in the successful defense at trial and on appeal of a shareholder derivative action that sought forced corporate dissolution and over $150 million in damages with all derivative claims dismissed, and a multi-hundred-thousand-dollar judgment procured in favor of client / defendants due to plaintiff’s “vexatious conduct.”
- Represented a well-known regional restaurant in its successful defense of hybrid Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) / state wage and hour collective and class action claims.
- Defended a Fortune 1000 CEO in multimillion-dollar business tort lawsuit. Authored and successfully argued motion to dismiss.
- Served as first-chair trial counsel for a government contractor in successful enforcement of employee noncompete agreements.
- Successfully defended claims brought under the False Claims Act, the Uniform Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act, Title VII, and the FLSA.
- Fairfax County Public Schools, student mentor
- Virginia Super Lawyers, Rising Stars, Employment Litigation: Defense, 2014-2019
- Washington, D.C., Super Lawyers, Rising Stars, Employment Litigation: Defense, 2015-2018, 2020
- Virginia Business Magazine, Legal Elite, Alternative Dispute Resolution, 2019; Legal Elite, Young Lawyers Under 40, 2017; Legal Elite, Commercial Litigation, 2015
- Martindale-Hubbell, AV Preeminent
- Quoted. “Spencer Fane Adds Quarles & Brady Labor Practice Pro,” Law360, February 2026
- “The Rundown on the Law of Workplace Romance,” HR Exchange Network, February 2023
- “Pregnancy Discrimination Act,” District of Columbia Women’s Bar Association, May 2016