Los Angeles

Locke Lord's Los Angeles office is a full-service office focusing on commercial and complex litigation, general commercial transactions, corporate representation, real estate, entertainment law, bankruptcy, restructuring and insolvency, investigations and insurance regulatory matters.

Litigation
Our Los Angeles team includes experienced lawyers litigating in individual and class action cases across diverse practice areas, including commercial disputes, employment/wage and hour, entertainment, environmental, private equity, insurance and reinsurance disputes and coverage analysis, intellectual property, product liability, toxic torts and unfair business competition. The Los Angeles office has significant experience representing financial services, insurance, entertainment, industrial and local government clients in litigation, transactional and regulatory matters. Our representative experience includes:

• Asserting claims on behalf of government entities for violations of the False Claims Act to recover amounts overcharged to the government
• Defending government entities and officials against taxpayer lawsuits under Section 526a of the Code of Civil Procedure for alleged government misconduct, waste or corruption
• Representing manufacturers, marketers and distributors of food, cosmetic and dietary supplements in consumer class action cases, including claims of false advertising, unfair competition, violation of California’s Restrictions on Unsolicited Commercial Email (Cal. Bus. & Prof Code § 17529.5(a)(2), California’s gift card refund law (Civil Code Section 1749.5) and California’s Proposition 65, as well as other warning, labeling and disclosure requirements for retailers in California
• Litigating trademark and copyright infringement actions, including on behalf of an international distributor of home goods, clients selling sports trading cards and the manufacturer of medical devices for aesthetic and surgical procedures
• Litigating individual, multi-plaintiff, collective and class action employment claims for violation of employment laws, including the California Fair Employment and Housing Act (including disputes involving allegations of employment discrimination and harassment) and the California Labor Code (including claims of unpaid wages, meal and rest breaks, unreimbursed business expenses, paystub penalties and retaliatory discharge)
• Litigating class actions brought under California's Unfair Competition Law and Consumers Legal Remedies Act
• Litigating numerous copyright and employment disputes on behalf of prominent talent agency, and entertainment studios and senior executives
• Providing employment advice and counseling to clients, including in-house lawyers, human resources professionals and small businesses, on a range of topics from wage and hour issues, hiring and firing issues, leave administration, disability accommodation and other complex issues that employers —particularly in California — face on a day-to-day basis
• Advising businesses on independent contractor issues, including advice on structuring independent contractor relationships to enhance compliance and better withstand legal challenges. Additionally, we have substantial experience, including trial experience, litigating individual and class action suits over independent contractor status
• Litigating on behalf of and counseling insurers regarding insurance breach of contract and bad faith claims involving matters of significant potential exposure relating to event cancellations, wildfires, products liability, property damage, marine, business interruption, construction, unfair business competition, toxic torts and aviation claims
• Advising boards of directors on, and conducting, internal and independent investigations
• Our attorneys also represent clients in private equity litigation involving distressed assets and due diligence.

 
Corporate & Transactional
On transactional matters, Locke Lord's attorneys in Los Angeles regularly lead merger and acquisition transactions, joint venture, financing transactions and corporate governance for clients in wide range of industries, including insurance, financial services, health care, software, manufacturing, retail and private educational institutions. Los Angeles lawyers also regularly work with Locke Lord's private equity and other clients as key members of deal teams for major mergers, acquisitions and similar transactions that leverage the Firm's nation-wide platform. In the insurance space, the team includes two high-level former California Chief Deputy Insurance Commissioners, who have unmatched experience working with insurance regulators on behalf of insurance and reinsurance clients nationwide, including on mergers and acquisitions. The team in Los Angeles also assists clients in the early stages of their business, advising entrepreneurs in connection with organizational and capital raising activities and both emerging businesses and venture capital firms in debt, equity and hybrid financing transactions, including private placements of securities. Los Angeles attorneys also handle technology and intellectual property matters involving patent, software and technology licenses, development agreements, outsourcing arrangements and similar agreements.

Real Estate
The principal real estate practice area of the Los Angeles office involves the representation of commercial banks, insurance companies and other institutional lenders, as well as private investors, local and regional developers and equity capital providers, including private equity firms, engaging in real estate transactions in California and throughout the U.S. The acquisition, disposition, financing and leasing transactions include properties as diverse as industrial facilities, office buildings, multifamily housing, residential tract developments, retail centers and hotels. The Los Angeles real estate lawyers have substantial experience representing construction lenders and borrowers in projects involving mezzanine debt and forward loan commitments as well as construction, bridge and permanent financing.

Maintaining a mortgage financing practice requires understanding of and experience in the exercise of creditor’s rights, and the Firm’s Los Angeles real estate lawyers have substantial experience representing lenders and investors in the restructuring, workout and foreclosure of troubled real estate investments, including properties in bankruptcy. The COVID-19 pandemic provided plentiful opportunities for the team to apply such restructuring and workout experience in the representation of property owners, including landlords and tenants, adversely affected by various state and local stay-at-home orders.

Los Angeles real estate lawyers regularly represent investors, developers and other commercial users in matters involving land use and condemnation issues, as well as transactions involving sustainable development and property contaminated by hazardous materials.

Giving Back
Our lawyers play a vital role in the community in which they live and work, including participation in local nonprofit and civic boards, working with community-based programs and supporting education, health and welfare, arts, children's and faith-based organizations. Members of our Los Angeles team sit on the boards of Public Counsel, the Mexican American Bar Foundation, Muslim Bar Association of Southern California, Inner City Law Center, Women Lawyers of Los Angeles Racial Justice and Equality Advisory Council and the Just the Beginning Summer Legal Institute steering committee, as well as the California State Bar’s Legal Services Trust Fund Commission. The Firm’s national commitment to pro bono legal services is evidenced by the decades-long commitment of its Los Angeles real estate lawyers to the pro bono representation of tenant associations and community based nonprofits in the development and preservation of affordable housing projects. Since 2004, the office has participated in Verbum Dei High School’s Corporate Work Study Program, which sends two students to work once a week plus one day per month in return for a portion of their tuition to be covered by the Firm.