Cotchett, Pitre & McCarthy, LLP

The United States District Court for the Northern District of California denied Wells Fargo’s motion to dismiss claims asserted in a shareholder derivative suit filed against Wells Fargo and certain of its directors, alleging that the Board of Directors breached its fiduciary duty and failed to oversee the Bank’s lending practices. As a result, the shareholder complaint alleges that Wells Fargo had racial gaps in its mortgage and refinancing loan portfolio. The shareholder plaintiffs are represented by co-lead counsel at Cotchett, Pitre & McCarthy LLP, Motley Rice LLC and Bleichmar Fonti & Auld LLP, who stated, “We’re very pleased with Judge Thompson’s well-reasoned and thoughtful opinion related to the claims that will move forward. This is an important corporate governance case for our clients, Wells Fargo and other stakeholders. We look forward to discovery.” Read the full order here - https://lnkd.in/gTe2chct

CPM IN THE NEWS: CBS News | Bay Area continues to focus on plastic pollution as Exxon hit with lawsuit "We know that Exxon for decades has known — because we've seen their internal documents — that plastics are not recyclable," said attorney Niall McCarthy. "Despite that fact, they've been promoting to the California public that plastics are recyclable, and deceiving consumers into using their products when only five percent of plastics are, in fact, recyclable." Watch the full interview here - https://lnkd.in/gvTxc9fs

A coalition of non-profit environmental organizations including the Surfrider Foundation, the Sierra Club, Heal the Bay, and San Francisco Baykeeper, represented by Cotchett, Pitre & McCarthy, filed a lawsuit against ExxonMobil (“Exxon”), the world’s largest producer of single-use plastic polymers. The complaint, filed in San Francisco County Superior Court, alleges violations of California nuisance law and California unfair competition law and alleges Exxon concealed the harms caused by single-use plastics. The suit further alleges that Exxon systematically led the public to believe that plastic waste is easily and safely disposable via recycling, incineration or landfills, when in reality, plastic persists in the environment for thousands of years, leaking toxic chemicals that are known to harm human health and the environment. Exxon’s conduct has exacerbated the environmental crises of plastic pollution and harmed California’s coasts and waterways. The California Attorney General’s Office filed a separate action Monday addressing the same crises. Read the full story here - https://lnkd.in/gJui2mqA

ON THE BLOG | Advocates for Justice - Justice Prevails: Banks Can Be Held Accountable for Elder Financial Abuse by Theresa Vitale Read the post here - https://lnkd.in/gxr4VSJi

Throwback Thursday // July 21, 2024 - The AAJ Employment Rights Section meeting that took place in Nashville! We had an amazing time celebrating Jennie Anderson’s incredible achievement with her age discrimination class action settlement award. Huge shoutout to Vice Chair, Tamarah Prevost, for her leadership during this unforgettable event!

Ryan Pincus, 37, was murdered at approximately 12:30 A.M. on August 4, 2023 in San Francisco by a single gunshot wound to the torso. Visiting San Francisco on business, Ryan, a Los Angeles-based insurance executive, was walking back to his hotel following a Giants game when he was fatally attacked by Allied Universal security guard Anthony Hodges in front of the Hotel Bijou near the intersection of Mason and Eddy streets. Anthony Hodges confronted Ryan, drew his firearm and fired, leaving Ryan to die on the street. Ryan’s family has filed a lawsuit in San Francisco Superior Court seeking to hold Allied Universal Security Services liable for its role in allowing its employee to violently shoot and kill a peaceful business traveler on a public street. Read the full story and complaint here - https://lnkd.in/gG6C-bAP

Congratulations to Joe Cotchett and Niall McCarthy on your selection to the prestigious Daily Journal Top 100 Lawyers list for 2024 in California! An outstanding achievement and a well-deserved recognition of your hard work, expertise, and dedication to the legal profession.

CPM IN THE NEWS: Daily Journal | Hawaii law makes insurers wait for Maui fire victims to be paid, attorneys say A unique Hawaii statutory procedure helped plaintiffs' attorneys in the Maui wildfire litigation stop insurance companies from being reimbursed for their payments to policyholders until all the victims had been made whole, as much as possible, from the limited $4.02 billion settlement. After the plaintiffs filed their lawsuits in the 2nd Circuit Court of Hawaii, 100 insurance companies sued the same defendants, but in the 1st Circuit Court, explained Frank Pitre of Cotchett, Pitre & McCarthy... Read the full article here - https://lnkd.in/gpREZRpw

Zack Zaharoff is a senior associate at Cotchett Pitre & McCarthy and a Bay Area native. Zack represents whistleblowers in corporate fraud cases, fights to protect seniors who are victims of abuse, and represents other clients that have been preyed upon or treated unfairly. Zack is an experienced civil litigator who cut his teeth handling commercial disputes for over five years at a premier international law firm in San Francisco and New York. He has experience leading case teams in all phases of litigation in state and federal courts across the country, as well as in Alternative Dispute Resolution. Prior to working at his previous firm, Zack served as a law clerk to the Honorable Philip R. Martinez, a former US District Court Judge for the Western District of Texas. Zack attended UC Berkeley for law school, where he served as a senior editor on the California Law Review and graduated at the top of his class as a member of the Order of the Coif. Zack also served as a judicial extern in the San Francisco chambers of the Honorable Michelle T. Friedland, a US Circuit Court Judge on the Ninth Circuit. He also holds a BA from the University of Washington, where he was a starting forward for the rugby team and worked as a bouncer at a local music venue. Zack spends most of his free time chasing around his toddler and spending time with his wife, a pediatrics and psychiatry resident at Stanford. He also enjoys golf, Bay Area sports, politics, music, movies, and exploring new restaurants.

CPM IN THE NEWS: The Recorder | 'A Prime Target': AT&T Hit With Class Action One Month After Disclosing Massive Data Leak Thomas Loeser, a partner at Cotchett Pitre & McCarthy’s Seattle office and a former federal cyber-prosecutor specializing in hacking data breach cases, said AT&T is a “prime target of all the most sophisticated hackers because of the amount of information that they collect.” His firm, he said, filed complaints in April against the company in California and Texas, later consolidated in the Northern District of Texas, targeting AT&T’s failure to prevent a data breach by criminal hacking group Shinyhunters—revealed by the company in March—that leaked the personal information of over 70 million current and former AT&T customers. There are three factors, he added, that make a company like AT&T vulnerable to cyberattacks. “One is how much data they collect, obviously, and how long they keep that data,” he said. “And a second factor is the extent to which they encrypt it and make it accessible and usable by not only their employees but other folks, as well. And then the third aspect is, of course, an important one, which is how much they’re willing to spend and do to protect their information that they have. And the FTC has issued guidance to companies about exactly those things, giving them really important advice about that … and the extent to which companies follow that guidance is directly related to the frequency at which their systems are breached.” Read the full article here - https://lnkd.in/gUqEkGQU