Holding the Powerful Accountable
HPM is a litigation firm built by former CFPB Enforcement leaders focused on high-impact cases against predatory corporate practices.
Practice Areas
Our work focuses on challenging systems that exploit workers, consumers, and communities.
CONSUMER RIGHTS
We challenge unlawful practices by banks, lenders, debt collectors, and fintechs that strip wealth from working families through predatory lending, illegal junk fees, and deceptive schemes that seek to ensnare people in endless cycles of debt.
TENANT RIGHTS
We fight for tenants facing illegal junk fees, unlawful evictions, and discriminatory housing practices at the hands of predatory landlords and corporate investors driving the affordable housing crisis. Our litigation challenges the financial actors and corporate abuses that exploit tenants for profit.
WORKERS' RIGHTS
We represent workers subjected to wage theft, illegal misclassification, invasive monitoring programs, and algorithmic wage-setting. Our litigation targets employers and industries that profit from exploitation, pursuing recovery for workers while challenging the systemic practices that keep wages low and working conditions unsafe.
CIVIL RIGHTS
We litigate on behalf of individuals and communities whose civil rights have been violated by powerful institutions — from discriminatory lending and predatory policing to the criminalization of poverty and the unlawful use of fines and fees. Our work challenges the legal and financial systems that perpetuate inequality across race, class, and geography.
About the Firm
Halperin Petersen & Mikkilineni (HPM) is a litigation firm built by former CFPB Enforcement leaders to do the work the federal government has abandoned — holding the powerful accountable for exploiting workers, consumers, and small businesses.
HPM brings cutting-edge legal firepower to strategic litigation against predatory corporate practices and abuses of power that burden people with debt – partnering with state attorneys general, advocacy organizations, and private co-counsel to deliver immediate relief and drive systemic change across the economy.
HPM was founded to build the kind of aggressive, independent enforcement operation that working people need, and that the moment demands. Our practice areas are united by a single conviction: that economic justice is the foundation of a fair society. Whether we are challenging illegal junk fees, debt traps, discriminatory housing and lending practices, or algorithmic manipulation and exploitation of data, we see these struggles as deeply interconnected — all part of an economy systematically rigged against working people.
Our litigation is designed to attack those systems at their roots, pursuing accountability not only for our clients, but as a means of dismantling the corrupt systems that make this exploitation possible.
We don’t just take cases. We challenge the systems behind them.
Holding the Powerful Accountable
HPM is a litigation firm built by former CFPB Enforcement leaders focused on high-impact cases against predatory corporate practices.
Holding the Powerful Accountable
HPM is a litigation firm built by former CFPB Enforcement leaders focused on high-impact cases against predatory corporate practices.
Leadership
Former federal enforcement leaders with decades of experience holding powerful institutions accountable.

Eric Halperin
Co-Founder & Partner
Former CFPB Enforcement Director

Cara Petersen
Co-Founder & Partner
Former Principal Deputy Enforcement Director, CFPB

Tara Mikkilineni
Co-Founder & Partner
Former Special Counsel, CFPB Enforcement

Adrienne Warrell
Senior Litigation Counsel
Former CFPB Enforcement Attorney

Nicole Mauri
Litigation Counsel
Former CFPB Enforcement Attorney
GET IN TOUCH
We partner with state attorneys general, advocacy organizations, and co-counsel to pursue high-impact litigation.
For inquiries, collaborations, or case referrals, get in touch.
