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Billy Wright Earns Successful Final Judgment on Behalf of First American Title Insurance Company
Category: News, Results | Friday, July 7th, 2017 | Comments Off on Billy Wright Earns Successful Final Judgment on Behalf of First American Title Insurance Company
In Jaisinghani v. U.S. Bank, et al., Los Angeles Superior Court Case No. SC125165, Judge Lisa Hart Cole, Billy Wright successfully represented First American Title Insurance Company in connection with the defense of an action brought by a borrower/developer who asserted numerous tort and contract-based claims relating to a multi-million dollar property in Malibu. The Court awarded First American with a favorable judgment after four rounds of demurrers brought by the Firm.
Early Sullivan Successfully Defends Warner/Chappell Music Against Breach of Contract Action
Category: News, Results | Monday, June 5th, 2017 | Comments Off on Early Sullivan Successfully Defends Warner/Chappell Music Against Breach of Contract Action
In Johnny Gill v. Warner/Chappell Music, Inc. et al., the firm successfully defended Warner/Chappell Music, Inc. against a breach of contract action brought by musician Johnny Gill, relating to the alleged failure to pay songwriting royalties owed to Gill.
Early Sullivan Obtains Dismissal of Action on Behalf of Fidelity National Title Insurance Company
Category: News, Results | Wednesday, May 10th, 2017 | Comments Off on Early Sullivan Obtains Dismissal of Action on Behalf of Fidelity National Title Insurance Company
In Pennymac Holdings, LLC v. Fidelity National Title Insurance Company, et al., Case No. A-16-746790-C, Nevada, the Firm represented Fidelity National Title Insurance Company against a lender claiming to have a priority lien. The case arose from Nevada’s controversial homeowners’ association lien priority laws. The Firm’s motion to dismiss caused the action to be dismissed in its entirety.
Eric Early, Scott Gizer and Diane Luczon Obtain Summary Judgment on Behalf of Homeowner
Category: News, Results | Friday, January 6th, 2017 | Comments Off on Eric Early, Scott Gizer and Diane Luczon Obtain Summary Judgment on Behalf of Homeowner
The firm obtained summary judgment on behalf of client Behrooz Salim in Saud v. Salim, et al., Case Number SC122618, Santa Monica, Judge Nancy Newman. Salim purchased a $7 million home in Beverly Hills, but Saudi Arabian Princess Seeta bint Abdulaziz Al Saud claimed she owned and never sold the property. The Princess sued Salim for ejectment and quiet title. Litigation in the case spanned three different Federal and State courts and several years. The Firm eventually filed a motion for summary judgment on the grounds that the Princesses’ action was barred by the three year statute of limitations governing quiet title actions based in fraud. The Court agreed with the Firm and granted summary judgment in favor of Salim, which ended the dispute and allowed Salim and his family to keep the Beverly Hills property.
The Firm Obtains Summary Judgment on Behalf of Sun West
Category: News, Results | Sunday, November 13th, 2016 | Comments Off on The Firm Obtains Summary Judgment on Behalf of Sun West
A class action lawsuit (Johnson v. Sun West Mortgage Company, Inc., et al., Case Number BC541571, Los Angeles Superior Court, Honorable John Shepard Wiley) was filed against our client, Sun West Mortgage Company, alleging that the company, as a reverse mortgage servicer, would obtain excessively priced lender placed insurance for its borrowers in exchange for various alleged kickbacks from insurers, and allegedly improperly backdated those policies even if there was no evidence of damage to the property being insured. On behalf of Sun West, the Firm filed a motion for summary judgment as to all five claims. The Court agreed with Sun West and granted the motion in its entirety. The Court found that class plaintiff Johnson provided no evidence to support his unsubstantiated claims, and that Johnson failed to provide any evidence to support his or the class’s theories that Sun West and Proctor Financial Inc. received “kickbacks” or commissions.
Peter Scott Obtains Full Dismissal of Charges Against Reconstruction Engineering Firm
Category: News, Results | Thursday, September 15th, 2016 | Comments Off on Peter Scott Obtains Full Dismissal of Charges Against Reconstruction Engineering Firm
The firm represented a collision reconstruction engineering firm at trial and obtained a full dismissal of charges that had been brought against the client by the California Attorney General’s Office. The case involved an Administrative Hearing before the State Board for Professional Engineers, Land Surveyors and Geologists and Dept. of Consumer Affairs. The matter, In re Alvin Lowi, Citation No. 10368-L, Office of Administration Hearings No. 2016021000, Hon. Jennifer M. Russell, was confirmed on appeal on what was essentially a matter of first impression.
Peter Scott Successfully Wins Appeal of Trial Court Order on Behalf of Client
Category: News, Results | Wednesday, June 15th, 2016 | Comments Off on Peter Scott Successfully Wins Appeal of Trial Court Order on Behalf of Client
In Manapat v. Hoffman, et al., LASC Case No. LC101642, Appellate Case No. B268328, the firm represented respondents/defendants in an appeal of a trial court order dismissing the entire case on demurrer. Our clients prevailed completely on appeal.
Early Sullivan Obtains Summary Judgment on Behalf of Afkarian
Category: News, Results | Friday, April 8th, 2016 | Comments Off on Early Sullivan Obtains Summary Judgment on Behalf of Afkarian
The firm obtained summary judgment for client Afkarian in Wells Fargo v. Afkarian, et al., Case No. 37-2014-00075037-CU-OR-CTL, San Diego Superior Court; Judge Judith Hayes, a case brought by Wells Fargo. Wells Fargo claimed to hold a $1.2 million lien on Afkarian’s property.
Early Sullivan Obtains Summary Adjudication, Near Immediate Case Settlement for Nursing Home Operator
Category: News, Results | Thursday, March 31st, 2016 | Comments Off on Early Sullivan Obtains Summary Adjudication, Near Immediate Case Settlement for Nursing Home Operator
The firm represented one of the leading nursing home operators in California against 18 causes of action arising from alleged financial malfeasance and investor-related fraud in Remba v. Preimesberger, LASC Case No. BC575724, Los Angeles Superior Court, Hon. Gregory Keosian. We obtained summary adjudication on behalf of our client on 17 of the 18 causes of action, which led to near immediate settlement of the case on favorable terms.
Tribe Member Knew Of Flaws In Trust Land Leases, Court Told – Law360
Category: News, Press, Results | Friday, March 4th, 2016 | Comments Off on Tribe Member Knew Of Flaws In Trust Land Leases, Court Told – Law360
Tribe Member Knew Of Flaws In Trust Land Leases, Court Told
By Jack Newsham
Law360, New York (March 3, 2016, 7:17 PM ET) — A group of Nevada homeowners being sued by a Native American man who says they illegally built their homes on his trust land asked a Nevada federal judge Tuesday to keep their counterclaims alive, saying Leon Mark Kizer took payments and signed off on leases he knew might be illegal.
More than 180 people asked U.S. District Judge Robert C. Jones to let their counterclaims against Kizer move forward, saying he unjustly profited from payments from them and PTP Inc., the developer of their subdivision, while failing to disclose communications with the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the Washoe Tribe of Nevada and California that suggested PTP’s 99-year master lease on Kizer’s land is illegal. The homeowners sublet their plots from PTP and have poured millions of dollars into building their homes there.
Kizer is seeking a declaratory judgment that PTP’s lease and all the subleases are invalid because the law only allows 25-year leases for Native American land. He has argued that the subletters’ beef lies with PTP and their title insurers, which are sophisticated companies and have profited much more than he did from the development of the Pine View Estates subdivision. Kizer has said he didn’t have an attorney when he signed off on the master lease or the subleases and said homeowners should have looked into the matter themselves.
But the homeowners, which seek unspecified damages in their counterclaims, blasted those arguments on Thursday, saying what Kizer called black-letter law that makes the master lease invalid is actually “hotly contested.”
“Kizer[] argues that counterclaimants’ reliance on his misrepresentations about the master lease’s validity was not justified because counterclaimants supposedly could have determined from publicly available information that the master lease was not valid,” the opposition said. “This argument is nonsense.”
The homeowners, who are being sued by Kizer along with their association, PTP and the BIA, also said two cases cited by Kizer to argue that federal policy barred their claims — Narragansett Indian Tribe v. RIBO Inc. and Heckman v. United States — actually support their argument. Both of those cases acknowledged a Native American could be held liable for luring people into signing void contracts and damaging them as a result, as the homeowners allege Kizer did in the nearly two decades that elapsed between when he leased his land to PTP and when he filed suit.
Jerome Miranowski, an attorney for Kizer, told Law360 his client didn’t learn about questions to the validity of the leases until 2008 or later, not 2006 as the homeowners allege, and he said the BIA alerted the homeowners to concerns shortly thereafter, in 2010.
A smaller group of subletters asserted counterclaims against Kizer in January.
According to his complaint, Kizer entered into a master lease with PTP for his land in 1997 that was approved by a BIA official. The complaint claimed that the BIA indicated to then-Washoe tribal chairman Brian Wallace in 2006 that both the length of the 99-year lease and the purchase option violated federal law.
Leases on Indian trust land for business purposes can’t exceed 25 years, or 50 with an extension, and non-Indians can only buy trust land at fair market value and with BIA approval, the complaint said.
Lawyers for the homeowners didn’t reply to a request for comment.
Kizer is represented by Aaron J. Harkins and Jerome A. Miranowski of Faegre Baker Daniels and Douglas R. Brown of Lemons Grundy & Eisenberg.
The homeowners are represented by Scott E. Gizer, Eric P. Early and Diane M. Luczon of Early Sullivan Wright Gizer & McRae LLP.
The case is Kizer v. PTP et al., case number 3:15-cv-00120, in the U.S. District Court for the District of Nevada.