Profile

Joe Khan is a partner in the firm’s Litigation, Environmental Law and Public Sector Law Sections. He is a renowned trial and appellate attorney with substantial experience prosecuting and defending civil and criminal cases in both state and federal courts. He is a trained mediator who leverages his experience and relationships in public, private and nonprofit sectors to resolve complex disputes with “win-win” outcomes.  Mr. Khan provides trusted counsel in a wide variety of representations, including appellate, criminal, environmental, elections, and public governance matters across Pennsylvania.

Mr. Khan joined Curtin & Heefner after serving more than three years as the Solicitor for Bucks County, where he was credited with “redefining the role of County Solicitor,” Mr. Khan’s leadership of the County’s first fulltime Law Department substantially improved outcomes and services while saving the County millions of dollars and modeling best practices on diversity and inclusion. In addition to overseeing all litigation for the County, Mr. Khan built partnerships with other public entities to protect voting rights, consumers, and the environment through innovative litigation, including the first lawsuit of its kind against social media companies for fueling a youth mental health crisis. He and his team also successfully drafted innovative legislation, including Pennsylvania’s only used car Lemon Law, and policy reforms on issues such as Fair Chance and Equal Pay hiring – all of which were enacted on a bipartisan basis. Mr. Khan also provided administrative oversight for the Department of Consumer Protection and Weights and Measures as well as the independent Office of the Public Defender.

Mr. Khan serves on the adjunct faculty at the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School. He previously served for a decade as an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, where he resolved high-stakes matters across southeastern Pennsylvania and led the historic City Hall corruption probes in Allentown and Reading. Since beginning his career prosecuting sexual assault, child abuse, and domestic violence in the Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office, his work and commentary have been featured often in national and local media.

Honors/Awards

Mr. Khan has received numerous awards for his exemplary service, including his tenure as Bucks County Solicitor. In 2022, the Pennsylvania Bar Association honored him as the Government Lawyer of the Year. The previous year, he received the Outstanding Solicitor Award from the County Commissioners Association of Pennsylvania. His nomination was supported by his peers in other counties, including a future Allegheny County judge, who wrote, “Joe was the uniting force in the effort to prepare for, execute, and ultimately defend the most difficult election Pennsylvania has ever conducted…without Joe’s diligence our state would have been in a far more dire circumstance.”

Charitable, Community and Civic Involvement

Mr. Khan resides in Bucks County with his two sons, whose teams he has coached through Penn Athletics, Doylestown Athletic Association, and Lenape Valley Baseball Association. He is a parent volunteer in the Central Bucks School District and has led several nonprofit boards. Mr. Khan previously served on the Pennsylvania Governor’s Advisory Commission for Asian Pacific American Affairs and has provided strategic advice to numerous political candidates and elected officials, including his brother, State Representative Tarik Khan.