Edward Maher (left) and Matt Pullen. Photos courtesy of Newmark / File
A bombshell lawsuit details a high-stakes leadership battle at Newmark’s Boston-based capital markets team, pitting brokers Edward Maher Jr. and Matt Pullen against its longtime leader, Robert Griffin Jr.
The court filing depicts a recent power struggle between Griffin and Maher over decision-making on personnel and compensation. It alleges that Newmark is waging “a sustained campaign of exclusion of Mr. Maher and Mr. Pullen from important business and client matters… They have been constructively terminated,” the complaint filed last week by attorneys Ellen Zucker and Paul Mastrocola of Boston-based Zucker Law Group LLP states.
In March, Co-Head of U.S. Capital Markets Griffin removed Pullen, a vice chairman, from the Boston-based team that has brokered many of the region’s biggest-ticket commercial real estate deals in the past decade.
The three brokers were among dozens of executives lured to Newmark in 2015 from Cushman & Wakefield in a major shake-up of the local commercial brokerage industry.
Since 2020, Griffin’s team has overseen over $20 billion in life science investment sales alone, according to Newmark.
But in 2022, Maher approached Newmark’s global leadership with concern “about the direction and the management of the capital markets team in Boston under the leadership of Mr. Griffin,” including the need for transparency of transactions, the commission pool structure, and personnel practices, the lawsuit states.
Newmark offered Maher a shared control agreement, under which he and Griffin would have equal responsibility over staffing and compensation matters for the Boston capital markets team beginning in April 2025. Maher and Pullen signed extensions of their employment agreements, with Maher named co-head of capital markets in Boston, while Pullen was promoted to vice chairman.
But after the shared control provision took effect in 2025, Newmark and Griffin allegedly began breaching its terms by determining bonuses and fee sharing without Maher’s input.
On March 4, Griffin removed Pullen from the Boston capital markets team and reassigned his desk to another part of the office, according to the lawsuit. The lawsuit says Newmark is seeking to drive Maher and Pullen out of the company by starving their business and blocking their access to a shared calendar.
“Cynically and without justification, the Newmark Defendants marginalized Mr. Pullen, removing him from the group through which he earns commissions. And they have wholly ignored their contractual arrangements with Mr. Maher, through which he had been granted joint decision-making power over matters such as Boston Capital Markets Team compensation and personnel,” it states.
The lawsuit was first reported by Law360.com.
The complaint has been assigned to the business litigation section of Suffolk Superior Court. It seeks declaratory judgments enforcing the shared control agreement, alleges breaches of Maher and Pullens’ employment contracts, and tortious interference with contractual/advantageous relations. It seeks unspecified monetary damages plus attorney’s fees.
A message was left with Newmark seeking comment.
