Gordon Rees Scully Mansukhani welcomes Robert M. Bodzin as a partner in the Commercial Litigation practice group in the firm's San Francisco office. Bodzin has moved his practice from Burnham Brown in Oakland where he had been a partner since 2003.
“We are very excited that Rob has joined us at Gordon & Rees," said Adam Sugarman, Managing Partner of the San Francisco and Oakland offices. "He is not only a highly regarded attorney, but a terrific person. Rob gives us another bona fide litigator on our already top-tier trial team. He will be a tremendous asset as we service the legal needs of our clients locally and nationwide.”
Bodzin is a litigator and trial attorney who for more than 25 years has successfully tried, mediated and arbitrated complex litigation cases on behalf of businesses and individuals in both California and New York. Bodzin manages a variety of commercial transactions, class actions and contract disputes including those arising from consumer and employment class actions, California Unfair Business Practices Claims under Business and Professions Code Section 17200 and 17500, the Consumer Remedies Act and those which assert breaches of fiduciary duties by directors, officers, business partners and LLC members. He has also represented clients in defending California state and federal class actions and the Telephone Consumer Protection Act.
He defends large corporations, small businesses and professionals in complex catastrophic personal injury/wrongful death/emotional distress cases arising out of trucking, transportation, logistics, disputes, farm, agricultural and equestrian claims. He also has coordinated legal responses to catastrophic events involving multiple areas of the law.
Bodzin provides strategic advice and consulting to large corporations, small businesses and individual clients on prospective litigation avoidance. In addition, he drafts and negotiates buy-sell agreements, contracts and corporate governance documents.
Outside the courtroom, Bodzin is an adviser and past chair to the Litigation Section of the California Lawyers Association (the section was formerly part of the State Bar of California.) He frequently is a speaker on panels for best practices in litigation and trials and serves as the co-chair for these events. He currently is a vice chair and a steering committee member of the Defense Research Institute's (DRI) Retail & Hospitality Committee. Bodzin regularly speaks at retail-law seminars, which include those sponsored by the California Retailers Association and DRI. Bodzin is an editor and author of multiple immediate DRI publications and the past publications chair for the DRI Retail & Hospitality Committee and the Commercial Litigation Committee.
From 2012 to 2019, Bodzin has continuously been named to the Northern California's "Super Lawyers" list. He is admitted in California, New York, New Jersey and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth and Second Circuits and multiple federal district courts in California and New York. Bodzin earned his law degree from Maurice A. Deane School of Law at Hofstra University in New York and his undergraduate degree from State University of New York at Albany.