The Fourth District affirms the trial court’s disqualification of counsel for reviewing and failing to immediately return attorney-client privileged documents. Grant Clark, represented by Higgs, Fletcher & Mack LLP (“Higgs”), sued VeriSign, Inc. for wrongful termination. The trial court disqualified Higgs after it found the firm had received and excessively reviewed privileged documents. The court [...]
The First District holds that an attorney engaging in ongoing serious ethical violations is not entitled to quantum meruit fee recovery. R. Thomas Fair began representing Karl E. Bakhtiari when he sought legal advice about real estate investments. Fair and Bakhtiari went into business together and operated under an oral agreement. For over a decade [...]
The Fourth District would not disqualify a law firm representing a public entity under a contingency fee agreement because the action was not brought on the public’s behalf, but in the entity’s own name to recover compensatory damages. The Orange County Water District incurred costs to investigate contamination in groundwater aquifers. It retained Miller, Axline [...]
The California Supreme Court overrules a Court of Appeal decision granting an anti‑SLAPP motion where an attorney acted adversely to his former client with respect to an ongoing matter that was the precise subject of his prior representation. Oasis West Realty (“Oasis Realty”) retained Reed Smith partner Goldman to represent it in its effort to [...]
The First District holds that an arbitrator was required to disclose that his practice focused upon representing lawyers in litigation with former clients. Nancy Kors disagreed with her attorneys, Benjamin, Weill & Mazer (“BWM”) about unpaid legal bills. When Kors moved to compel arbitration under the California Arbitration Act (“CAA”), the trial court directed binding [...]
The Second District holds that a provision in a contingency fee agreement that mandated the case proceed to settlement or trial was void as against public policy. Don Lemmer represented Jeffrey Charney on an hourly basis in a lawsuit against Charney’s former employer Teleflora LLC. After several months, the parties entered into a new contingency [...]
The First District holds attorney conduct warrants substantial sanctions. Michael and Andrew Watters of O’Brien Watters & Davis LLP represented Jill Davenport in her dissolution. Her former husband Ken Davenport was represented by multiple different law firms. The proceedings were extensive, and generated nineteen volumes of court files, considered outrageous in a family law case. [...]
The Third District holds pleadings filed by a disqualified attorney may be stricken. Leon Schimmel served as medical director for Community Health Associates Medical Group (“Community Health”). He was defended in a wrongful termination suit filed by a former employee by Kelli Kennaday and her firm, Wilke, Fleury, Hoffely, Gould & Birney (Kennaday). Read The [...]
The Second District holds that the case-with-a-case proof of causation generally applicable to malpractice and breach of fiduciary duties claims is irrelevant to claims that an attorney misappropriated settlement funds. Luis Gutierrez was represented in a class action against his employer Lockheed Corporation by Thomas Girardi and his law firm. Over a ten year period [...]
The Second District holds that actual injury sufficient to trigger the statute of limitations did not occur at the time a partnership agreement was drafted, but sixteen years later, when the dissolution provision of the agreement was triggered or when plaintiffs began to incur legal fees in response to a third party’s attempt to dissolve [...]
