Since the firm’s formation, attorneys at Ford, Walker, Haggerty & Behar have specialized in representing municipalities, metropolitan transit authorities, school districts and police departments in lawsuits seeking recovery for a variety of claimed damages resulting from personal injury, slip-and-fall accidents, use of public transit, environmental clean-up claims, property damage, alleged dangerous conditions of public property, inverse condemnation proceedings, contractor claims, employment disputes and prosecution of claims arising under the False Claims Act.
The attorneys at Ford, Walker, Haggerty & Behar who specialize in defending public entities draw on collective experience of nearly 70 years of defending general liability claims. We have had significant success in obtaining dismissals of civil rights and other claims against public entities through motion practice in both state and federal courts. When a case needs to be further litigated, we have teams of aggressive and experienced litigators who possess the resources and skills to handle the case through trial.
We have extensive experience in representing public entities and agencies at various levels including cities and counties. Representative clients include the City of Los Angeles, City of Long Beach, County of Riverside, County of Monterey and other municipalities, public entities and school districts in all aspects of municipal civil litigation.
With regard to municipality liability, FWHB is efficient in early identification of deficiencies in alleged liability cases, successfully challenging lawsuits by way of summary judgment motions as was demonstrated most recently in 2019 for the City of El Cajon, County of San Diego (Guerrero v. City of El Cajon). Our insight can quickly eliminate or reduce the value of any claim, making desired resolution more attainable.
On a broader basis, FWHB is deeply experienced in risk avoidance, indemnification rights and allocation of fault for multi-system structures, improvements, and roadways constructed by a government owner’s chosen vendors and their subcontractors, designers and engineers. We are also able to take an active role in contract writing and negotiation to protect the owner’s position and effect compliance with often changing California legislation in the area of fault allocation.
As FWHB draws on many years of experience from our attorneys we can provide a wide variety of representation for numerous types of claims. Additional experience includes things such as representing local airports in defense of their liability claims to county cases involving dangerous conditions and motor vehicle negligence to things such as defending the Newport Harbor on a theft of a yacht case to a negligently designed and supervised triathlon in the Dana Point Harbor. Whatever the need may be our teams of attorneys are ready to handle all aspects of Municipal Liability.