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Celeste Phillips is a partner in the firm and has represented journalists for over two decades, concentrating her practice in defamation, privacy and related media litigation and counseling for daily newspapers, magazines, and broadcasters, as well as book and newsletter publishers.

Ms. Phillips has served as newsroom counsel to a number of daily newspapers and other media entities, including the San Francisco Examiner and The Orange County Register, providing guidance to editors and reporters at each step of the newsgathering process, from prepublication review, to gaining access to records, to ensuring the protection of confidential sources and other privileged materials.   In addition, she has participated in the defense of significant defamation actions brought against a host of media entities, including the Center for Public Integrity, The New Republic, and CBS News. 

Ms. Phillips is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of the University of California at Berkeley (A.B. 1978, summa cum laude) and received her law degree from the University of California, Hastings College of the Law (J.D. 1981), where she was Order of the Coif, and a Note and Comment Editor of the Communications Law Journal.  Prior to joining Levine Sullivan Koch & Schulz, L.L.P. when the firm was founded in 1997, Ms. Phillips was a partner in the Washington D.C.-based firm Ross, Dixon & Masback, L.L.P. and was associated with Pillsbury, Madison & Sutro in San Francisco.  Ms. Phillips is admitted to practice in the courts of California and the District of Columbia, as well as in the United States Supreme Court, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, and the United States District Court for the Northern District of California.