Practice Areas
Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein, LLP is a fifty-plus attorney law firm with offices in San Francisco, New York and Nashville. We have affiliations with attorneys worldwide.
Since 1972, Lieff Cabraser has successfully represented plaintiffs in individual lawsuits and class actions in the fields of securities and investment fraud, personal injury and mass torts, environmental and toxic exposure, non-personal injury product defect, antitrust, consumer protection, employment discrimination and unfair employment practices, and civil and human rights. Our comprehensive and diverse practice is unique among law firms that represent only plaintiffs.
For each of the last six years, the National Law Journal has selected Lieff Cabraser as one of the top plaintiff law firms in the United States. Below is a summary of our practice areas.
Antitrust
Federal and state antitrust laws are designed to protect the economy and to promote competition among businesses by prohibiting price fixing and other forms of anticompetitive conduct.
Claims for damages under the federal antitrust laws are ordinarily limited to businesses or individuals who purchased goods or services directly from the person or company that violates the antitrust laws. Many state antitrust laws, however, including California’s, also allow consumers and other end-users of products to receive compensation resulting from anticompetitive conduct, even if they did not purchase goods or services directly from the person or company that violates the antitrust laws.
Lieff Cabraser has successfully prosecuted hundreds of lawsuits in federal and state courts on behalf of businesses, governmental entities and consumers for violations of antitrust laws. We represent clients challenging cartel price-fixing across a wide range of industries, conspiracies among would-be competitors, monopolization, and other anti-competitive practices by many of the world's largest corporations.
Lieff Cabraser has played a prominent role in federal litigation under the Sherman Act on behalf of businesses in numerous markets including carbon fiber, compact discs, diamonds, flat glass, industrial pigments, linerboard, plastic laminates, polypropylene carpets, prescription drugs, and vitamins.
In recent years, we have successfully litigated antitrust claims against Microsoft Corporation for monopolistic practices, El Paso Gas Co. and wholesale electric companies for allegedly manipulating the price of energy in California, and the cosmetics industry for engaging in anticompetitive practices to prevent discounting of department store cosmetics.
For a list of our current antitrust
class actions, click here.
To contact an antitrust attorney
at Lieff Cabraser, click here.
Aviation Law
Representing clients in aviation cases requires sensitivity and compassion as well as extensive knowledge and experience in the complex field of aviation law sufficient to determine the cause of aviation tragedies and obtain fair compensation for the victims or their families. With offices in San Francisco, New York, Nashville, and affiliations with lawyers worldwide, Lieff Cabraser is uniquely positioned to answer your questions and represent your interests.
A Commitment To Superior Legal Representation
We appreciate that it is a time of deep pain and grief for the families of
those who perished following an aviation disaster. Even so, you will likely
have questions as to why the accident occurred,
what the duties and responsibilities of the airline and the aircraft manufacturer
might be and the precise nature and extent of your legal rights.
Our attorneys are committed to upholding the rights of aviation disaster victims and promoting aviation safety. We invest the resources necessary to succeed in every case we accept, and to providing the very best representation and support possible for our clients. We regularly communicate with our clients and work closely with them throughout the litigation process. Our attorneys work as a team, drawing upon their combined knowledge, training, and skills to provide our clients with decades of experience in the field of global aviation law.
With each case we take on, we seek not only to represent our clients, but also to bring about change in the aviation industry. Airlines, airports, airplane manufacturers, and governmental agencies have the duty to protect the safety and security of passengers. We are committed to representing the interests of victims in aviation disasters and to ensuring that passenger safety and security is the aviation industry's number one priority.
Experienced Aviation Attorneys With A Global Expertise
Described by The American Lawyer as "one of the nation's premier plaintiffs' firms," Lieff Cabraser attorneys have over forty years of experience litigating aircraft accident cases. We represent passengers and persons on the ground injured in aircraft accidents, and the families of loved ones who perished. Our premier litigation team includes internationally-renowned aviation safety, airport design and operations, and disaster reconstruction experts to assist in the investigation of cases and provide expert analysis of aviation incidents. Our attorneys have repeatedly secured substantial recoveries for victims of aviation disasters and their families.
Our legal skills, along with our ability to advance the costs in our clients' cases, enable us to take on the most powerful corporations in the world and the large defense firms that represent them. We have successfully litigated against many of the world's largest commercial airlines and aircraft manufacturers, including Boeing and Airbus.
The innovative work of our attorneys has helped establish the precedent that citizens of countries outside the United States can assert claims in American courts and obtain substantial recoveries against American plane and component manufacturers for aircraft accidents occurring abroad. We also have developed a network of experienced aviation lawyers on every continent with whom we work closely with in representing clients in their own countries.
Notable Cases
Lieff Cabraser has prosecuted aviation cases since its founding in 1972. Among the firm's notable early aviation cases was representing passengers and families of passengers injured and killed in the United Airlines Boeing 747 cargo door catastrophe near Honolulu, Hawaii in 1989. Our firm organized the prosecution of the case, which included claims brought against United Airlines and Boeing Corporation. We developed a statistical system for settling the passengers' and families' damages claims against defendants United Airlines and Boeing Corporation, and coordinating individual wrongful death trials against the non-settling defendants which continues to be used in cases today.
In the 1990s, Lieff Cabraser's aviation practice expanded to the representation of families of victims of aviation disasters abroad. For example, we represented families of the passengers on Aeroflot Russian International Airlines Flight SU593, which crashed in Siberia in 1994 killing all 70 people on board.
According to a transcript of the cockpit voice recorder, the captain's two children entered the cockpit during the flight and were allowed to take turns flying the plane. The autopilot apparently was inadvertently turned off and the plane went into a fatal nosedive. The aircraft lacked an auditory warning system to alert the pilots that the autopilot system had been disengaged.
Alongside European co-counsel, Martin-Chico & Associates, Lieff Cabraser filed suit in France where Airbus, the aircraft manufacturer, was headquartered. All the families represented by Lieff Cabraser obtained substantial economic recoveries in a settlement of the action.
This decade, Lieff Cabraser has successfully prosecuted a number of cases arising out of aviation disasters in the United States and worldwide against major airlines, aircraft equipment manufacturers, and aircraft manufacturers. These cases have included:
We also represent families of victims of helicopter and single engine aircraft
crashes. Read
a list of Lieff Cabraser's recent aviation cases.
Contact Lieff Cabraser
We welcome the opportunity to advise you on the facts of your case and legal remedies. There is no charge or obligation for our review. Please use our online form to contact us or call us toll-free at 1-800-541-7358 and ask to speak to Lieff Cabraser partner Lexi Hazam.
We are committed to providing superior representation of the interests of victims of aviation disasters and to ensuring that passenger safety and security is the aviation industry's highest priority.
Additional Resources
Consumer Protection
State and federal laws provide consumers with broad protection from false and misleading advertising and unfair or deceptive business acts or practices.
Lieff Cabraser represents consumers in class action lawsuits against some of the nation's largest corporations seeking to uphold consumer rights. For example, we succeeded in preventing Wells Fargo Bank from charging customers, often seniors on fixed income, fees on checking accounts that Wells Fargo promised would remain free for the lifetime of the accounts when they were opened.
We have successfully represented homeowners in cases against title insurance companies for charging fees for services never performed and against mortgage lenders and loan servicing companies that engaged in deceptive business practices.
Our lawyers have taken a leading role curbing deceptive and fraudulent business practices in the credit card industry. We have obtained recoveries in class actions cumulatively involving millions of credit cardholders. Cardholders were charged excessive interest, and late and over limit fees by their credit card companies.
For a list of our current consumer protection lawsuits, click
here. To contact a Lieff Cabraser consumer
protection attorney, click
here.
Defective Consumer & Homeowner Products
State and federal laws provide consumers with remedies for
products that do not perform as warranted or advertised. Lieff Cabraser is nationally recognized
for our successful prosecution of lawsuits involving a wide range of such defective
products, from faulty building and home products to defective cars, tires, computers
and electronic products.
One of our notable faulty home product cases was the 1998 settlement of nearly $70 million on behalf of property owners whose
ABS drainage pipe caused property damage by leaking.
Commenting on the work of Lieff Cabraser and co-counsel, California Judge Mark
B. Simons on May 14, 1998 stated, "The attorneys who were involved in the
resolution of the case certainly entered the case with impressive reputations
and did nothing in the course of their work on this case to diminish these reputations,
but underlined, in my opinion, how well deserved those reputations are."
For a list of our pending product defect cases, click
here. To contact an attorney at Lieff Cabraser handling defective products
cases, click here.
Unfortunately, it is also common for computers
and other electronic products to contain defects or to fail to perform as advertised.
Each year hundreds of recalls occur due to defects in home and desktop computers,
notebooks, monitors, LCD screens, CD, DVD and disc drives, power adapters and
batteries.
Lieff Cabraser has successfully represented consumers in
a wide range of cases against major manufacturers involving defective computers
and computer components. Click
here to contact an attorney at Lieff Cabraser handling computer and electronic
component defect cases.
Employment Law
- Employment Discrimination Lawsuits
Federal and state anti-employment discrimination laws
prohibit discrimination in the work place based on an employee's race, color,
religion, age, gender, or disability. In addition to overtime pay lawsuits, Lieff
Cabraser has helped employees nationwide challenge discrimination in the workplace
and initiated lawsuits to compensate the victims of discrimination.
Among the many successes by Lieff Cabraser on behalf
of employees in employment discrimination class action lawsuits was the representation
of a class of approximately 25,000 female employees of, and applicants for employment
with, Home Depot. In 1998, the Court approved a settlement of the case in which
Home Depot agreed to modify its hiring, promotion and compensation practices,
and paid $87.5 million, one of the highest amounts ever paid in a gender discrimination
case.
We successfully prosecuted
a class action lawsuit in federal court alleging that the hiring
and employment practices of Abercrombie & Fitch Co., one of the nation’s
largest clothing retailers, discriminate against Latino, Asian-American and
African-American applicants and employees.
- Employee Overtime Pay Lawsuits
Lieff Cabraser also represents employees in overtime pay lawsuits.
Sometimes employers misclassify their employees as "exempt," "managers,"
"executives" or "independent contractors" as a way to
prevent those employees from receiving benefits and overtime. Examples include
people who work in chain restaurants as managers yet are also required to wait
tables and work at the cash register, and IT tech workers who install and maintain
computer software and equipment.
Wage and hour suits also arise when employers do not pay
employees for all hours worked, even though the work performed is required
by the employer and benefits the company. These cases can involve claims
the employer forces employees to work "off the clock." IT industry workers who feel they are not being paid for all hours worked can learn more about their legal rights by clicking here.
Lieff Cabraser litigates claims on behalf of employees
and/or retirees alleging interference with their interests under the federal
Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA). Among its provisions, ERISA
recognizes that pension and 401k plan trustees owe fiduciary duties to the participants
and beneficiaries in these plans.
You can learn more about ERISA law and related cases by reading our Frequently Asked Questions about ERISA law.
For a list of our current employment law cases, click
here. To contact a Lieff Cabraser employment attorney, click
here.
Environmental Law and Toxic Exposures
The discharge of toxic chemicals and hazardous materials
into the environment can have a devastating effect on the health, livelihood,
and property values of those in the vicinity. Environmental pollution may occur
over an extended period -- such as the leaking of gasoline from
an underground storage tank that results in groundwater contamination -- or swiftly
and catastrophically from disasters and accidents at oil refineries, transportation
carriers, and coal mining operations, etc.
Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein, LLP, has prosecuted many environmental law lawsuits, obtaining compensation
for families and property owners harmed by toxic environmental exposures.
• Exxon Valdez Oil Disaster & Class Action lawsuit
The Exxon Valdez ran aground in March of 1989, spilling 11 million gallons of oil into Prince William Sound and killing tens of thousands of wild creatures and fouling 1,300 miles of beaches and surface waters. Lieff Cabraser was co-counsel
for commercial fishermen, area businesses, property owners, and native Alaskans
who brought claims against Exxon Corporation arising out of the spill.
On June 25, 2008, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled to permit the assessment of punitive damages in the Exxon Valdez maritime spill under maritime law. However, the Court held that the earlier punitive damages award against Exxon was excessive and should be limited to $507.5 million, an amount equal to the trial court’s calculation of appropriate compensatory damages. Learn more about the Exxon Valdez oil spill litigation.
• Kentucky Coal Sludge Litigation
On October 11, 2000, a coal waste impoundment (like a lagoon or a lake) near Inez, Kentucky, ruptured, resulting in the spill of 300 million gallons of coal sludge onto many of our clients' properties and into waterways running through the region. The impact of the spill was enormous. Black water and coal sludge surged out of the impoundment, eventually covering more than 75 miles of the area waterways.
According to officials from the United States Environmental Protection Agency, it was the worst environmental disaster of its type ever in the southeastern United States. In lawsuits arising out of the spill, Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein, LLP, along with local co-counsel, represented over 400 property owners in and around Inez. Learn more about the Kentucky coal sludge litigation.
• Toms River Childhood Cancer Cases
Over a period of several decades, chemical plants owned by Ciba Specialty Chemicals, Union Carbide, and other area business released industrial pollutants into the Toms River. Other industrial pollutants leached into the township's groundwater supply. In 1995, a state study found that the incidence of cancer among children in Toms River was higher than any other part of the state.
With co-counsel, Lieff Cabraser represented 69 families, each with children having cancer, that claimed the cancers were caused by environmental contamination in the Toms River area. Learn more about the Toms River childhood cancer cases.
• Louisiana Crawfish Crop Losses | Aventis ICON Class Action
With co-counsel, Lieff Cabraser represented crawfish farmers in Louisiana who suffered tremendous losses in their pond-grown crawfish crops, allegedly as the result of the use of ICON, a pesticide manufactured by Aventis CropSciences.
Plaintiffs charged that ICON was toxic to crawfish and caused a decline in the crawfish crop. In 2004, the Court approved a $45 million settlement of the class action lawsuit. Learn more about the Louisiana crawfish case.
• Sacramento River Spill Cases
On July 14, 1991, a Southern Pacific train tanker car derailed in northern California, spilling 19,000 gallons of a toxic pesticide, metam sodium, into the Sacramento River near the town of Dunsmir. The metam sodium mixed thoroughly with the river water, having a devastating effect on the river and surrounding ecosystem. In addition, many residents living along the river became ill with symptoms that included headaches, shortness of breath, and vomiting.
Lieff Cabraser served as Court-appointed Plaintiffs' Liaison Counsel, Lead Class Counsel, and chaired the Plaintiffs' Litigation Committee in coordinated proceedings that included all of the lawsuits arising out of this toxic spill. Settlement proceeds of approximately $16 million were distributed pursuant to Court approval of a plan of allocation to four certified plaintiff classes: personal injury, business loss, property damage/diminution, and evacuation.
Current Toxic Spill | Environmental Exposure Investigations
Lieff Cabraser is currently investigating the December 22, 2008, spill of more than a billion gallons of coal fly ash from a burst dike on a retention pond at the Kingston Fossil Plant (Kingston Steam Plant) in Eastern Tennessee. The spill is one of the largest of its kind ever in the U.S., covering 600 or more acres with sludge.
Contact National Environmental Law | Toxic Exposure Attorneys
Lieff Cabraser maintains offices in New York, San Francisco and Nashville. To contact
an environmental law attorney
at Lieff Cabraser, click here.
International
Litigation
Lieff Cabraser has been at the forefront of recent litigation filed in
both United States courts and abroad to remedy the abuses of civil and human
rights or provide recovery for economic losses by persons worldwide.
For several years, we have represented the estates of Holocaust
victims, survivors and family members in cases against Swiss and other
European banks, European insurance companies, and European industrial companies
that used concentration camp inmates as slave laborers.
As part of this effort, we served on the Plaintiffs' Executive
Committee that prosecuted and settled the case against Swiss banks. We were also
instrumental in prosecuting Holocaust-era cases against German private enterprise
for using slave and forced labor, and against German (and other) banks and financial
institutions for "aryanizing" the property of victims of Nazi persecution.
Together, settlements in these cases have totaled over $6.3 billion.
To read about our pending international and
human rights cases, click here. To contact
an international law and human rights attorney at Lieff Cabraser, click
here.
Personal Injury and Wrongful Death
The laws of most states provide remedies for personal injuries caused by the negligence of other, including compensation for pain and suffering, lost wages and past and future medical expenses.
A personal injury action is a lawsuit brought by an individual who has suffered physical or mental harm as the result of the wrongful conduct of another. A wrongful death action is a lawsuit brought by a deceased person's family or beneficiaries that alleges the death was attributable to the willful or negligent act of another.
Since our founding in 1972, we have handled and resolved thousands of personal
injury and wrongful death cases in state and federal courts throughout the country.
Currently, we are prosecuting scores of lawsuits involving injuries and deaths
resulting from all types of negligent conduct and design defects. We are also representing
patients who received defective medical devices, contaminated blood products,
and prescription drugs with undisclosed, dangerous side effects.
To learn more about our personal
injury cases, click
here. To contact an attorney at Lieff Cabraser experienced in personal injury
and wrongful death cases, click
here.
Securities & Investment Fraud
Federal and state laws provide individual and institutional investors with remedies for securities fraud by companies issuing securities, their officers and directors, underwriters, and accounting and other professionals who may be involved in the fraud. Common claims include "fraud on the market," where a company artificially inflates or maintains the market price of its stock by misrepresenting or failing to disclose the company's true financial performance.
Lieff Cabraser is nationally recognized for its representation of shareholders in cases alleging violations of federal securities laws by major corporations and their directors.
Not all of our securities cases are brought on behalf of individual investors. We also represent individuals with substantial claims, venture capitalists, institutional investors, and public pension plans.
To learn more about our securities
practice, please click
here. To contact a securities and investment fraud lawyer at Lieff Cabraser, click here.
Important Note: This summary is intended to provide a basic overview
of typical cases of our firm. It is for informational purposes only and
does not constitute legal advice. Please read our disclaimer.
About Lieff Cabraser
Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein, LLP is a fifty-plus attorney law firm that has represented plaintiffs nationwide since 1972. We have offices in San Francisco, New York and Nashville. We represent plaintiffs in class and group actions and in individual lawsuits in cases involving substantial losses. For the last six years, the National Law Journal has selected Lieff Cabraser as one of the top plaintiffs' law firms in the nation.
Notice
This website is sponsored by Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein, LLP, a national plaintiffs' law firm.
Notice: Lieff Cabraser attorneys provide legal advice and practice law for clients in
federal courts throughout the United States and in state courts where we are
licensed to practice. Please read our disclaimer.
Copyright © 2009 Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein,
LLP.
No persons pictured on this website are clients of Lieff Cabraser.