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Mark K. Kitabayashi is a senior litigator in the Los Angeles office. He has more than 19 years of litigation experience, predominantly in the areas of employment, local government issues, products liability, environmental, business, construction defect, and personal injury defense. Mr. Kitabayashi has first and second chaired numerous jury and bench trials and handled more than 75 arbitrations and mediations. Recently, his practice has been focused on employment issues for government entities located in Southern California.
Significant Cases: Stringfellow v. State of California. At the time, the largest toxic tort personal injury case in U.S. history. Claim of personal injury and property damage by approximately 3000 plaintiffs due to claimed exposure to a "toxic soup" of materials that emanated from the Stringfellow waste facility. Plaintiffs? verdict against the client was less than $200,000.00.
Shiell v. County of L.A. Equal protection action claiming staff members of a non-profit, public benefit corporation were entitled to the same rights, salaries and benefits of County employees because they performed the same work. Dispositive motions were brought on 3 issues: 1) statute of limitations; 2) entitlement to civil service; and 3) entitlement to County retirement benefits. All three motions were decided in the County's favor. Hall v. County of L.A. Approximately 200 female attorneys of a non-profit, public benefit corporation brought a sex discrimination suit claiming they were not receiving the same salaries and benefits as male employees of the County, even though they were doing the same work. The County brought a dispositive motion on the grounds that plaintiffs were using improper male comparators and had not shown any indicia of discrimination. The motion was granted.
Mr. Kitabayashi received his J. D. from the University of Southern California in 1986. He was admitted to the California State Bar that same year. He earned a B. A. from the University of California, Los Angeles, in 1983. He is also admitted to practice before the U.S. Court of Appeals and the U.S. District Court, Central District. | 