Orange County lawyers this past year have been involved in everything from accusations that a police chief was spying, to a $50 billion lawsuit against opioid makers, to the women’s national soccer team players suing to gain equal pay with their male counterparts.
One firm is even involved in “Cattlegate,” which seems as dramatic as the hit TV series “Yellowstone.”
The Business Journal asked some of Orange County’s best-known lawyers about notable cases and transactions they’ve been involved with. What follows are their responses.
• The Newport Beach office of O’Melveny & Myers LLP represented Johnson & Johnson and its subsidiary Janssen Pharmaceuticals in an opioid lawsuit that was one of the biggest in recent years.
In the People of the State of California v. Purdue Pharma LP et al., in the Superior Court of the State of California, County of Orange, some of California’s largest municipalities, including Los Angeles and Orange counties, were seeking $50 billion to expand public-nuisance laws address opioid-related harms purportedly caused by J&J;, Teva, Allergan and Endo.
The drug manufacturers were accused of misleading marketing and promotion that fostered medically inappropriate prescriptions, drug abuse, and overdoses.
Michael Yoder, a partner in O’Melveny’s Newport Beach office, led the O’Melveny team representing J&J; and its Janssen Pharmaceuticals unit at trial.
Yoder—a former president of the Orange County Bar Association—was the face of the defense as liaison counsel.
Following a seven-month trial, Yoder’s team persuaded the court to rule in favor of J&J; and three other pharmaceutical manufacturers, ending the attempt by four local governments to expand public-nuisance laws to address alleged opioid-related harms.
In so doing, Judge Peter J. Wilson rejected the plaintiffs’ public nuisance, unfair competition, and false advertising claims.
Judge Wilson’s ruling was finalized in December when he signed his statement of decision and judgment, rejecting 50 separate objections by the plaintiffs.
• Seymour B. Everett III, managing partner of Irvine’s Everett Dorey LLP, represented Santa Ana Police Chief David Valentin when he was accused of spying on police union chief Gerry Serano.
“The allegations are false and intended to serve as a smear campaign against Chief Valentin and other defendants,” Everett said. “Based on our review of the meritless allegations in the complaint, it appears the goal of the union president is to create leverage for personal financial gain even at a harmful cost to the union members.”
Everett also helped the city of Costa Mesa win a court argument that it has the authority to regulate sober living homes.
“Orange County has been plagued by unscrupulous sober living home operators resulting in deaths and negatively impacting residential neighborhoods throughout Orange County,” Everett said. “Costa Mesa is the only city to successfully stand up to the unscrupulous operators by creating a common-sense City Ordinance that requires sober living homes to provide 24 hour supervision, anti-curbing of residents, no-drug policies, good neighbor policies and place restrictions against operators who are sex-offenders or convicted felons.”
Costa Mesa has been targeted by eight different sober living home operators in lawsuits filed in federal court; Everett Dorey has prevailed in five cases and a sixth is scheduled for trial later this month.
It also helped the city of Orange evict a soup kitchen that it said led to a significant increase in crime. Elsewhere, it’s been representing Los Angeles governmental entities being sued for methane leaks, toxic odors in El Segundo and the “Getty Fire.”
• Snell & Wilmer’s Debbie Gubernick represented plaintiff NorthStar Moving in a federal trademark infringement case involving allegations that another firm infringed NorthStar’s trademark by deceiving consumers into believing they were hiring NorthStar Moving.
The case involved allegations of cybersquatting, trademark infringement and unfair competition.
In a separate case, Roger Grad and Michael Angel, also of Snell & Wilmer, represented the beneficiary of a $21 million trust whose sister, as trustee, filed a petition to remove him from the trust.
In addition, the trustee attempted to deny the existence of the trust as a charitable remainder annuity trust, which would have denied the beneficiaries of $3.5 million in tax benefits and enabled the sister to receive a lump sum payment at the expense of the charity that was the residual beneficiary of this annuitized trust.
• Bryan Gadol, head of Holland & Knight’s California Corporate, Mergers and Acquisitions and Private Equity practice, said he led several transactions recently that helped maximize growth and liquidity for Orange County businesses and private equity investors:
Notably, he was involved with Newport Beach-based Lugano Diamonds and Jewelry Inc. in connection with its $256 million recapitalization with Compass Diversified (NYSE: CODI).
Under the deal, the company continues to be operated by its leadership team, and existing owners and management retained a significant minority stake.
“Bryan and his team were invaluable in assisting us with our partnership with Compass Diversified and we could not be happier with the value added by the Compass team to date,” said Moti Ferder, founder and CEO of Lugano Diamonds.
Holland & Knight also represented Solis Capital Partners, a Newport Beach-based private equity firm, in its partnering investment with Premier Auto Supplies LLC, a Miami-based distributor of paint and related supplies in South Florida and Texas.
• Greenberg Gross is representing the PG&E; Fire Victim Trust in its cases against former PG&E; vegetation-management contractors and major management consulting firms for contributing to the causes of deadly wildfires in Northern California.
It’s also speaking for the family of a Mater Dei High School football player seeking to recover damages for injuries he suffered during a hazing ritual, and to shed light on attempts by the school administration to cover up the incident.
Greenberg Gross represents Alexandra Zarini, a member of the Gucci fashion family, in a case filed under the California Child Victims Act for the sexual assaults she allegedly suffered at the hands of family members.
On the defense side, the firm represents Erika Girardi, a star of the “Real Housewives of Beverly Hills,” in bankruptcy and related proceedings connected to her estranged husband, Thomas Girardi.
In a high-profile civil RICO case with more than $130 million at issue, the firm represents Advantage Solutions Inc. (Nasdaq: ADV), an Irvine-based sales and marketing company with over $3 billion in annual revenue (see story, page 1).
• Michele Johnson, who works in the Costa Mesa office of Latham & Watkins, represented the U.S. Soccer Federation when it was sued by women’s national team players.
The players had been seeking $66.7 million in back pay from U.S. Soccer in the long-running dispute that dates back to 2016, when the players filed a complaint with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
The litigation turned ugly for the U.S. Soccer when the federation and its prior attorneys from Seyfarth Shaw LLP made controversial legal arguments that the women’s team players are not entitled to equal pay because they do not work in the same establishment nor do they “perform equal work requiring equal skill, effort and responsibility under similar working conditions,” according to the Law360 website.
U.S. Soccer later disavowed that line of argument and replaced its legal defense team with Latham & Watkins where Johnson has been the global chair of the litigation and trial department since 2019.
The two sides on Feb. 22 reached a $24 million settlement to end the equal pay and pay discrimination litigation just weeks before the Ninth Circuit was set to hear the case.
• Buchalter represents the official committee of unsecured creditors for Easterday Farms in the largest pending agricultural bankruptcy cases in the country, with over $300 million in claims and $200 million in assets liquidated to date.
Among Buchalter attorneys on this case are Joseph Welch, Julian Gurule and Rebecca Wicks.
The cases, known locally in Washington state as “Cattlegate,” came about when Cody Easterday, who managed the Easterday’s three-generation family farm, pled guilty to federal charges for defrauding Tyson Food of over $230 million by selling them 200,000 “ghost cattle,” which existed on paper only, over a five-year period, to offset massive losses he incurred speculating in the commodity futures markets.
Antitrust lawsuits pending against Tyson and other big meat suppliers, meanwhile, allege that Tyson and others engaged in price fixing of the spot market for cattle, an ironic twist that suggests Tyson may be responsible for the Easterday’s losses.
The case highlights the severe economic pressures brought to bear on family farms, as well as the increasingly monopsonistic control of the meat supply in the United States, the law firm said. The cases remain pending.
