Honorable John K. Trotter, Jr. (Ret.) | |
---|---|
![]() | |
Former Presiding Justice of the California Court of Appeal, 4th District | |
In office 1982–1987 [1] | |
Appointed by | Jerry Brown [1] |
Personal details | |
Born | [1] New York City,U.S. [1] | February 25,1934
Education | Loyola College (now Loyola Marymount University), [1] Santa Monica College, [1] University of Southern California Law School (J.D. 1961) [2] |
Profession | lawyer,judge,mediator |
Awards | "Appellate Justice of the Year" Award,by California Trial Lawyers Association; "Justice of the Year Award",by Los Angeles Trial Lawyers Association [3] |
John K. Trotter Jr. (born February 25,1934) is an American jurist who served for 5 years as the Presiding Justice of the California Court of Appeal,Fourth Appellate District,Third Division. [1] After 1987,he was a major contributor to the advancement of Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) [2] [3] as one of the founding members of JAMS. [4]
John K. Trotter,Jr.,a native of New York City,New York,was born in 1934. [1] While in high school,he moved with his family to San Diego County. On a basketball scholarship,he attended Loyola College,but he entered the U.S. Army to serve in the Korean War. He then attended Santa Monica College,and as a returning veteran with high grades,he achieved early admittance to University of Southern California Law School. He completed his J.D. degree in 1961.
John Trotter while in private practice specialized in civil litigation,and as a trial lawyer tried in excess of 100 jury trials in State and Federal Court. [2] Trotter was president of the Orange County Bar Association for 1978–1979. [1] Trotter in 1979 became a Superior Court Judge in Orange County. Trotter during the early 1980s helped form Amicus Publico,which later became the Public Law Center for Orange County.
Governor Jerry Brown in April 1982 appointed Trotter to Division Two of the 4th District of the California Court of Appeal. [1] In November 1982,Trotter was appointed as the Presiding Justice of the newly created Division Three of the 4th District,starting out with a 300 case backlog. The court became further backlogged with many new appeals,which Trotter credited to the high number of complex civil cases. Trotter set up a process so that the justices could type their opinions directly into a computer to avoid writing the opinions by hand. By 1985,the justices were writing an average of 140 opinions per year,more than elsewhere in California.
John Trotter in 1987 took early retirement from the California Court of Appeal to join JAMS,an Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) organization. [2] [5] While with JAMS,he became one of the leading experts in ADR,with extensive knowledge of ADR hearing formats and procedures. [6] [3] He has successfully resolved thousands of cases involving a variety of types of cases,including mass torts,class actions,and personal injury. Trotter has served as Special Master in several multi-district litigation pharmaceutical matters,in the Toyota Sudden Acceleration case,and other complex cases in both Federal and State court,supervising the claims and payment to thousands of plaintiffs in each litigation.
Trotter has received many honors and recognitions over his career,to name just a few: [3]
In 1979,Trotter was appointed to the position of Superior Court Judge in Orange County. [1] [2]
In April 1982,Trotter was appointed by Governor Jerry Brown to the position of Associate Justice,California Court of Appeal,4th District,Division 2,in San Bernardino. [1] [2]
In November 1982,Trotter was appointed by Governor Jerry Brown to the position of Presiding Justice,California Court of Appeal,4th District,for the newly created Division 3,in Orange County. [1] [2]
In 1983,Trotter was appointed to the temporary position of Associate Justice Pro Tem,Supreme Court of California. [2] [7]
In 1987,Trotter took early retirement from his position at the California Court of Appeal. [2] [5]
In the case Register Div. of Freedom Newspapers,Inc. v. County of Orange (1984) (158 Cal.App.3d 893.),a newspaper wanted to discover notes and reports by Orange County's claims settlement committee. [1] In this case of a police misconduct lawsuit brought by a jail inmate,Trotter concluded that “the public interest in finding out how decisions to spend public funds are formulated and insuring governmental processes remain open and subject to public scrutiny”outweighs any interest that Orange County might have in keeping secret its settlement policy and decisions. This opinion required public entities to publicly disclose previously secret settlement agreements with tort litigants.
John Trotter designed the process and supervised the resolution of the wildfire victim claims resulting from the Witch Creek Fire and the Rice Canyon Fire caused by San Diego Gas &Electric power lines in 2007. [2] [3]
In 2010,U.S. District Judge James V. Selna assigned the JAMS neutrals Justice John K. Trotter (Ret.) and Justice Steven J. Stone (Ret.) to be the Special Masters in the Toyota unintended acceleration multi-district litigation. [6]
In 2020,John Trotter was assigned as the Trustee of the Fire Victim Trust [8] [9] [3] as part of the reorganization plan [10] of the 2019 bankruptcy of Pacific Gas and Electric Company resulting from the Camp Fire,Tubbs Fire,Butte Fire,and also a series of wildfires beginning on October 8,2017,collectively called the 2017 North Bay Fires. A major investigation by station KQED and NPR’s California Newsroom found that John Trotter billed $1,500 an hour for his work as Trustee. [11]
Dispute resolution or dispute settlement is the process of resolving disputes between parties. The term dispute resolution is sometimes used interchangeably with conflict resolution,although conflicts are generally more deep-rooted and lengthy than disputes. Dispute resolution techniques assist the resolution of antagonisms between parties that can include citizens,corporations,and governments.
Champerty and maintenance are doctrines in common law jurisdictions that aim to preclude frivolous litigation:
Malicious prosecution is a common law intentional tort. Like the tort of abuse of process,its elements include (1) intentionally instituting and pursuing a legal action that is (2) brought without probable cause and (3) dismissed in favor of the victim of the malicious prosecution. In some jurisdictions,the term "malicious prosecution" denotes the wrongful initiation of criminal proceedings,while the term "malicious use of process" denotes the wrongful initiation of civil proceedings.
Kenneth Roy Feinberg is an American attorney specializing in mediation and alternative dispute resolution. He served as the Chief of Staff to Senator Ted Kennedy,Special Master of the U.S. government's September 11th Victim Compensation Fund and the Special Master for TARP Executive Compensation. Additionally,Feinberg served as the government-appointed administrator of the BP Deepwater Horizon Disaster Victim Compensation Fund. Feinberg was also appointed by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts to administer the One Fund—the victim assistance fund established in the wake of the 2013 Boston Marathon bombings. Feinberg was also retained by General Motors to assist in their recall response and by Volkswagen to oversee their U.S. compensation of VW diesel owners affected by the Volkswagen emissions scandal. Feinberg was hired by The Boeing Company in July 2019,to oversee distribution of $50 million to support 737 MAX crash victim families. Feinberg is also an adjunct professor at the Columbia University School of Law,University of Pennsylvania Law School,Georgetown University Law Center,New York University School of Law,the University of Virginia School of Law and at the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law.
Jack Bertrand Weinstein was a United States district judge of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York. Until his entry into inactive senior status on February 10,2020,he maintained a full docket of cases.
Shira A. Scheindlin is an American attorney and jurist who served as a United States district judge of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York.
Allen Martin Linden,,was a Justice of the Federal Court of Appeal and distinguished tort law professor. He was named an Officer of the Order of Canada in 2015.
Tort reform refers to 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.
Mustafa Kamal was the 10th Chief Justice of Bangladesh. His landmark judgment was on the Masdar Hossain case,widely known as the 'separation of judiciary',which was a milestone in the quest for separation of power between the judiciary and the executive of the state. Kamal was a pioneer of alternative dispute resolution (ADR) in Bangladesh,and is considered by many as the 'father of ADR' in Bangladesh.
William Johnson Elfving is an American lawyer and former judge of the Superior Court of California,County of Santa Clara. He was appointed to the bench on November 13,1997 and retired in 2017. Prior to his appointment he was in private practice for 30 years. He is the chair of the Superior Court Arbitration/ADR committee. He is most notable because of his many rulings on specialized areas of intellectual property law.
Theodore H. Frank is an American lawyer,activist,and legal writer,based in Washington,D.C. He is the counsel of record and petitioner in Frank v. Gaos,the first Supreme Court case to deal with the issue of cy pres in class action settlements;he is one of the few Supreme Court attorneys ever to argue his own case. He wrote the vetting report of vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin for the John McCain campaign in the 2008 presidential election. He founded the Center for Class Action Fairness (CCAF) in 2009;it temporarily merged with the Competitive Enterprise Institute in 2015,but as of 2019 CCAF is now part of the new Hamilton Lincoln Law Institute,a free-market nonprofit public-interest law firm founded by Frank and his CCAF colleague Melissa Holyoak. The New York Times calls him the "leading critic of abusive class-action settlements";the Wall Street Journal has referred to him as "a leading tort-reform advocate" and praised his work exposing dubious practices by plaintiffs' attorneys in class actions.
Kreindler &Kreindler LLP is a U.S. law firm founded in 1950 with offices in New York,California and Massachusetts. The firm specializes in air disaster litigation and has represented plaintiffs in most major aviation disaster litigations. According to the New York Times,Lee Kreindler,a named partner of the firm,was "considered the founder of air disaster law."
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 represent from counsel or an attorney.
Stephen Gerard Larson is a former United States District Judge of the United States District Court for the Central District of California and a partner in the Los Angeles law firm of Larson LLP,which he co-founded in 2016 as Larson O'Brien LLP. He consistently ranks among the top litigators in the U.S.,having been recognized by The Best Lawyers in America©for his work in Commercial Litigation and Criminal Defense:White-Collar since 2015.
Malcolm Millar Lucas was an American jurist and attorney who served as the 26th Chief Justice of California. He previously served as a trial judge on the Los Angeles County Superior Court and United States District Judge of the United States District Court for the Central District of California.
Elizabeth Annette "Beth" Grimes is an Associate Justice of the California Second District Court of Appeal,Division Eight,having been appointed to the post by Republican Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2010.
In re Garlock Sealing Technologies,LLC is a court case heard in the United States District Court for the Western District of North Carolina which involves the entry into bankruptcy proceedings by Garlock Sealing Technologies,once a manufacturer of coated asbestos gaskets,as a result of potential liability from current and future settlements. The plaintiffs were over 4,000 asbestos victims suffering from mesothelioma,including many Navy veterans,as well as an unknown number of future mesothelioma victims. As noted by the court,mesothelioma "is always fatal,causing death essentially by suffocation within about eighteen months of diagnosis" and involves "a horrific death."
Elizabeth D. Laporte is a former United States Magistrate Judge of the United States District Court for the Northern District of California. She retired from the court on October 25,2019. She previously served as the Chief U.S. Magistrate Judge for the District from 2013–2015.