Purpose | Consumer Advocacy |
---|---|
Location | |
Membership | 3,000 lawyers |
Key people | Nancy Drabble, CEO |
Formerly called | California Trial Lawyers Association |
Consumer Attorneys of California(CAOC) is a professional trade organization consisting of more than 3,000 California lawyers who represent the interests of consumers as plaintiffs in civil tort actions and in the California Legislature. [1] The organization's lawyer members support access to justice by representing plaintiffs in civil litigation on a contingency-based fee system. [2] According to the Consumer Attorneys of California, its members represent individuals harmed by misconduct by corporate and government entities with greater access to resources. [3] Up until 1995, it was known as the California Trial Lawyers Association. [4] The organization's longtime CEO is Nancy Drabble, who, in 2022, was recognized for her efforts to help bring about a compromise between different interest groups for doctors, lawyers, and insurance companies, to help pass legislation that adjusts the cap on non-economic damages in medical malpractice cases for inflation under the Medical Injury Compensation Reform Act (MICRA). [5] [6]
A contingent fee is any fee for services provided where the fee is payable only if there is a favourable result. Although such a fee may be used in many fields, it is particularly well associated with legal practice.
Attorney's fee is a chiefly United States term for compensation for legal services performed by an attorney for a client, in or out of court.
Personal injury is a legal term for an injury to the body, mind, or emotions, as opposed to an injury to property. In common law jurisdictions the term is most commonly used to refer to a type of tort lawsuit in which the person bringing the suit has suffered harm to their body or mind. Personal injury lawsuits are filed against the person or entity that caused the harm through negligence, gross negligence, reckless conduct, or intentional misconduct, and in some cases on the basis of strict liability. Different jurisdictions describe the damages in different ways, but damages typically include the injured person's medical bills, pain and suffering, and diminished quality of life.
Robert Leslie Shapiro is an American attorney and entrepreneur. He is best known for being the short-term defense lawyer of Erik Menéndez in 1990, and a member of the "Dream Team" of O. J. Simpson's attorneys that successfully defended him from the charges that he murdered his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and Ron Goldman, in 1994. He later turned to civil work and co-founded ShoeDazzle, LegalZoom, and RightCounsel.com, appearing in their television commercials.
A personal injury lawyer is a lawyer who provides legal services to those who claim to have been injured, physically or psychologically, as a result of the negligence of another person, company, government agency or any entity. Personal injury lawyers primarily practice in the area of law known as tort law. Examples of common personal injury claims include injuries from slip and fall accidents, traffic collisions, defective products, workplace injuries and professional malpractice.
Melvin Mouron Belli was a United States lawyer and writer known as "The King of Torts" and by insurance companies as "Melvin Bellicose". He had many celebrity clients, including Zsa Zsa Gabor, Errol Flynn, Chuck Berry, Muhammad Ali, The Rolling Stones, Jim Bakker and Tammy Faye Bakker, Martha Mitchell, Maureen Connolly, Lana Turner, Tony Curtis, and Mae West. During his legal career, he won over $600 million in damages for his clients. He was also the attorney for Jack Ruby, who shot Lee Harvey Oswald days after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.
The Medical Injury Compensation Reform Act (MICRA) of 1975 was a statute enacted by the California Legislature in September 1975 (and signed into law by Governor Jerry Brown in September), which was intended to lower medical malpractice liability insurance premiums for healthcare providers in that state by decreasing their potential tort liability.
Tort reform consists of changes in the civil justice system in common law countries that aim to reduce the ability of plaintiffs to bring tort litigation or to reduce damages they can receive. Such changes are generally justified under the grounds that litigation is an inefficient means to compensate plaintiffs; that tort law permits frivolous or otherwise undesirable litigation to crowd the court system; or that the fear of litigation can serve to curtail innovation, raise the cost of consumer goods or insurance premiums for suppliers of services, and increase legal costs for businesses. Tort reform has primarily been prominent in common law jurisdictions, where criticism of judge-made rules regarding tort actions manifests in calls for statutory reform by the legislature.
The Healthcare Quality Improvement Act of 1986 (HCQIA) was introduced by Congressman Ron Wyden from Oregon.
Pro se legal representation comes from Latin pro se, meaning "for oneself" or "on behalf of themselves" which, in modern law, means to argue on one's own behalf in a legal proceeding, as a defendant or plaintiff in civil cases, or a defendant in criminal cases, rather than have representation from counsel or an attorney.
Legal financing is the mechanism or process through which litigants can finance their litigation or other legal costs through a third party funding company.
The Washington State Association for Justice is a trade association of over 2,200 plaintiff's attorneys and staff, with offices in Seattle, Olympia and Spokane.
Stephen Daily Susman was an American commercial plaintiffs attorney, and founding and name partner of Susman Godfrey LLP. He won more than $2 billion in damages and settlements in just three cases, including a $1.1 billion settlement on behalf of Texas Instruments in Samsung Electronics v. Texas Instruments, and a $536 million jury verdict in El Paso Natural Gas Co. v. GHR Energy Corp.
The Consumer Attorneys Association of Los Angeles (CAALA), previously the Los Angeles Trial Lawyers Association (LATLA), is one of the largest associations of plaintiffs lawyers in the United States. Although CAALA refers to itself as a local association, it has almost 3,000 members and is larger than all but six state trial-bar associations. CAALA's annual Las Vegas convention is the largest gathering of plaintiffs lawyers in the United States and its magazine, The Advocate, is the most widely circulated trial-bar publication in the country.
Patrick A. Malone is a trial lawyer and author based in Washington, D.C. Malone co-developed a trial advocacy method called "Rules of the Road".
Eric Gibbs is an American attorney at Gibbs Law Group LLP in the United States. He is a member of the Board of Governors of the Consumer Attorneys of California. As a part of the American Association for Justice, he co-chairs the Consumer Privacy and Data Breach Litigation Group and the Lumber Liquidators Litigation Group, and serves as the secretary for the Qui Tam Litigation Group.
Ervin A. Gonzalez was an American civil trial attorney whose practice focused on wrongful death, personal injury, medical negligence, product liability and class action torts. He was a partner with the law firm Colson Hicks Eidson in the firm's Coral Gables office.
Reid Collins & Tsai LLP is a national trial law firm with offices in New York, Austin, Dallas, Wilmington, and Washington, D.C. The firm represents plaintiffs in complex commercial litigation on a mixed-fee or contingency-fee basis.
Lieff Cabraser is an American plaintiffs' law firm headquartered in San Francisco. The firm was founded in 1972 by Robert L. Lieff. Elizabeth Cabraser became a partner in 1981.
Cohen Milstein is an American plaintiffs' law firm that engages in large-scale class action litigation. The firm filed a number of lawsuits against Donald Trump during and after his presidency, including a lawsuit which successfully blocked the Trump administration's attempt to roll back the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. Cohen Milstein has made the implementation of corporate diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs a key part of its litigation strategy. The firm has been hired by various state attorneys general to assist in complex litigation, including by suing ExxonMobil over climate change. Anita Hill was formerly of counsel at Cohen Milstein.