Trial/Arbitration Results
In a construction action our firm represented a cement subcontractor whose work was inadvertently involved in an underground sewer line being filled with concrete. The cost to remove the concrete was $3 million. A Los Angeles jury agreed with our position that the general contractor, responsible for constructing certain bulkheads was liable for the loss because a failure of the bulkheads to escape into the sewer line. The majority of our client's fees and expenses were recovered on the basis of judicious statutory settlement offer and an attorney's fees clause in the contract.
We defended a $2 million personal injury claim against a contractor who reportedly left a fire hose along the gutter of a street over a three-day holiday weekend. A motorcyclist drove over the hose at low speed, fell over, claimed injuries from the fall, and subsequently underwent three back surgeries. Plaintiff's medical bills approximated $375,000. We demonstrated to a San Diego jury that the accident resulted from driver error, not from the hose. After a favorable jury verdict, our client was awarded over $50,000.00 in expert fees and court costs, once again through the effective use of a statutory settlement offer.
We represented a general contractor in a breach of contract action in which he sought to recover monies due for an extensive remodeling project he performed on a single-family home in the Los Angeles area. The homeowners brought a counter-claim asserting that our client's work was defective. The jury agreed completely with our position and (1) awarded our client 99% of the monies we presented as still due and owing and (2) rejected all of the homeowners defect claims. Once again, the court awarded our client his full attorney's fees and costs pursuant to contract and his expert fees and costs following statutory offer to compromise the homeowners declined to accept.