PROFESSIONAL LIABILITY
As a law firm dedicated to defending and
counseling professionals, we have a unique understanding of the
special needs of clients that have been accused of malpractice. We bring to each new case a
strategic perspective based on our experience in handling
literally thousands of professional liability matters. We
appreciate the value of our clients’ professional reputations
and understand the implications of a malpractice claim. We respect our clients’ time.
Our attorneys keep themselves apprised of, and analyze,
developing
legislation and case law impacting California professionals.
We
monitor legal trends in all fifty states that could affect our
clients. Our depth of knowledge gives us insight into how
malpractice
claims arise and how they can be resolved.
Although we are most well-known for our
representation of judges, lawyers and architects, as detailed
below, our focus on professionals includes securities brokers,
accountants, directors & officers, real estate professionals,
insurance brokers and others.
We are proud to be lawyers' lawyers. We have
defended judges, law firms and individual lawyers in thousands of
lawsuits. We have tried more than fifty legal malpractice cases to
jury verdict. Our appellate advocacy on behalf of lawyers has
yielded more than thirty published opinions.
We have defended malpractice cases involving
virtually every substantive area of the law including intellectual
property, employment, commercial, transactional, bankruptcy,
securities, insurance, tax, family, personal injury, and criminal.
We have counseled and represented lawyers in state bar proceedings
and other investigations. We have defended lawyers in malicious
prosecution cases.
Our lawyer clients have ranged from solo
practitioners to some of the largest firms in California. We
represent self-insured law firms and firms insured by every major
liability carrier in the field.
We write and speak on law firm management and
legal malpractice prevention. Our attorneys have served on the
legal malpractice committees of the San Francisco, California and
American Bar Associations. The chairperson of Long & Levit's
Professional Liability Group, Joe McMonigle, recently completed
his second term as the chairman of the American Bar Association's
Standing Committee on Lawyers' Professional Liability. For the
last several years, a Long & Levit attorney has been the
chairperson of the Legal Malpractice Committee of the Bar
Association of San Francisco. We regularly present MCLE seminars
on legal ethics and/or preventing malpractice. Long & Levit
attorneys have testified as expert witnesses on legal
malpractice/standard of care issues in dozens of cases.
Because lawyers' professional liability law is
ever-developing, we closely monitor judicial opinions and
legislation impacting our clients. We publish via email and on
this site regular Professional Liability Case Updates reporting on
important new state and federal opinions involving legal
malpractice.
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Architects, Engineers & other Design Professionals
Long & Levit LLP is unequaled in its
service and commitment to architects, engineers, other design
professionals and the construction industry. Many of our lawyers
were educated as architects and engineers, and many practiced as
professionals in those fields. We do not waste time learning
about your business. We simply know how buildings are designed,
built and maintained. This expertise translates into
knowledgeable, insightful, cost-effective legal
representation.
Our reputation as one of the nation's premier
law firms representing the needs of architects, designers and
the construction industry allows us to serve a variety of
clients ranging from the largest international architecture and
design firms to solo practitioners. Regardless of the size or
scope of your firm, Long & Levit LLP devotes the same
careful attention to your concerns.
All our design clients benefit from our full
range of services: we serve virtually every legal and business
need of our clients. Our loss-prevention seminars and counseling
services help clients avoid exposure to damages and insurance
crises. We prepare and review professional services agreements
between design professionals and clients, prime design
professionals and their consultants, and construction contracts
including general and supplementary conditions. We assist in
forming businesses and drafting employee manuals and employment
contracts. We help resolve disputes among partners and
shareholders. If you choose to dissolve your business, we can
show you how to phase out current projects and manage ongoing
liabilities.
We help clients with fee collection strategies
by drafting special contract provisions, preparing demand
letters, filing design professionals/mechanics liens and stop
notices. We assist in transferring plans, drawings,
specifications and other documents, whether in CAD or any other
format. We also help register and protect your copyrights,
trademarks and service marks.
Long & Levit LLP is respected for its
ability to settle disputes without resorting to a formal dispute
resolution process. This saves our clients both time and money.
If necessary, we offer assistance in mediation, arbitration and
litigation. Our partners and associates have served as mediators
and arbitrators, and our trial attorneys are acknowledged
experts in construction litigation. And after a case is over, we
help our clients understand how to avoid problems in the future.
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Long & Levit LLP is one of a handful of
law firms with comprehensive expertise both in the defense of
litigation involving claims against directors & officers and
in the unique insurance coverage issues those claims typically
present. The D&O group has developed particular expertise in
issues involving directors and officers of financial
institutions and lender liability coverage, bankers'
professional liability and financial institution bonds.
Under the growing number of "duty to
defend" policies, Long & Levit LLP is frequently
appointed to defend insured directors and officers.
Increasingly, this defense includes companies themselves under
policies that include "entity" coverage. Importantly,
Long & Levit LLP has a long history of defending and trying
the claims out of which D&O litigation commonly arises:
employment and discrimination suits, securities fraud class
actions, corporate governance disputes, commercial and financial
institution litigation and financial fraud suits.
Among the most frequent services Long &
Levit's D&O group provides (often in conjunction with our
insurance coverage lawyers) are:
- Defense of self-insured directors and
officers or those with duty-to-defend policies;
- Liability analysis and settlement
negotiations; . Defense monitoring, cost control and billing
audits;
- Loss control and claims prevention
services;
- Coverage counseling and
litigation.
As D&O insurance carriers' counsel, Long
& Levit also provides representation as monitoring counsel
and litigation counsel, each involving different types of legal
applications. As monitoring counsel, we provide coverage
opinions, analyses and evaluation of claims against the insureds,
monitor the progress and cost of the insureds' defense and
negotiate the insurer's contribution to settlements. As
litigation counsel to carriers, the group represents insurers in
coverage, bad faith and policy rescission actions.
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Accountants
Long & Levit has defended more than 500
lawsuits against accountants involving every area of practice:
accounting and audit, tax, management advisory services, executive
search, and consulting. We also have a loss prevention practice
focused on the practice management needs of small and medium-sized
accounting firms. Our attorneys are active in industry groups at
the local, regional and national levels and regularly speak and
write on loss prevention topics of interest to accountants.
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Long & Levit LLP's focus on defending
professionals includes insurance and real estate brokers and
agents, securities brokers, mortgage lenders, clergy,
psychiatrists, psychologists, family and marriage counselors,
title insurers, home inspectors, travel agents and others.
Since the firm's inception, Long & Levit has
represented insurance brokers and agents in business and
partnership matters. A natural outgrowth of that practice, and the
firm's expertise in insurance matters, has been our representation
of insurance professionals against malpractice claims. Our
understanding of both first and third party insurance policies and
coverages places us in a unique position to evaluate these
malpractice claims quickly and efficiently.
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