Brian J. Panish and Deborah S. Chang of Panish | Shea | Ravipudi LLP have been named 2019 California Lawyer Attorneys of the Year (CLAY) by Daily Journal. The 23rd Annual CLAY awards publication recognizes attorneys in 20 areas of legal practice whose work made a significant impact during the previous year; Mr. Panish, Ms. Chang and veteran appellate specialist Alan Charles Dell’Ario were selected in the area of Personal Injury for a case resolving the standard of care a school owes its students.
In March 2018, the California Supreme Court issued a decision determining that public universities and colleges in the Golden State owe a duty of care to their students to protect them from foreseeable acts of violence by fellow students. The 7-0 decision issued in The Regents of the University of California v. Superior Court of Los Angeles County reversed a decision by the Second District Court of Appeal which sided with UCLA and dismissed a lawsuit against the University of California Regents filed by Plaintiff Katherine Rosen, a UCLA pre-med student who had been slashed across the throat and brutally stabbed multiple times by a mentally ill student while working in a chemistry lab on campus.
“This is a big deal that will help a lot of people beyond our client,” Mr. Panish said of the outcome so far.
“It’s like we’ve been in a time machine, and now were on the verge of finally getting our day in court,” Ms. Chang added.
As noted in the Daily Journal, the case seeking justice for Ms. Rosen was filed nearly 10 years ago and although Plaintiffs counsel lost 2-1 at the court of appeal on their first trip there on the duty to warn issue, a dissent by Justice Dennis J. Perluss foreshadowed how the high court would rule. “Justice Perluss was all over our negligence argument,” Mr. Panish said. “The Supreme Court essentially adopted his analysis.”
For more on the case in the 2019 CLAY Awards publication, visit DailyJournal.com