Overview
Barbara Croutch is a partner in the Litigation, Insurance Recovery & Counseling, and Environmental practice groups at Greenspoon Marder LLP. She focuses her practice in the areas of class actions, commercial litigation, complex product liability and toxic torts litigation, insurance recovery disputes, environmental contamination litigation, and personal injury and wrongful death defense.
She has worked closely with major manufacturers and consumer-facing businesses to resolve claims alleging injuries due to various products, asbestos, silica, aluminum oxide, emissions, rat bite fever, bird fever, and other zoonotic diseases. She has also represented policyholders in pursuing both first- and third-party insurance bad-faith claims and has successfully recovered millions of dollars on their behalf. She represents businesses in defense of environmental contamination claims arising from Superfund sites in California.
Further, Ms. Croutch has represented clients in numerous other product liability and commercial actions, including automobile, antitrust, breach of contract, environmental contamination claims, and real estate disputes through jury and non-jury trials, domestic and international arbitrations, and mediations.
Ms. Croutch was a former Staff Registered Nurse (R.N.) in critical care who specialized in intensive care, coronary care, cardiovascular surgery, and trauma.
Bar Admissions
Court Admissions
- U.S. Supreme Court
- U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
- U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California
- U.S. District Court for the Central District of California
- U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California
Education
- J.D., Loyola Law School, 1990
- B.S., Mount St. Mary’s College, Nursing, 1983
Experience
Professional and Community Involvement
- 50/50 Women on Boards, Leadership Committee, Member, 2016-2020
- American Bar Association, Member
- California Board of Registered Nurses
- Los Angeles County Bar Association
Representative Experience:
- Representing businesses in defense of environmental contamination claims arising from Superfund sites in California.
- Served as national counsel obtaining a defense verdict for major pet retailer against a $20 million wrongful death claim in a four-week jury trial. The case involved a 10-year-old boy who had died after allegedly contracting rat bite fever (RBF) from a rat sold by the client.
- Prevailed in a two-phase bench trial for a Chinese raw fiberglass manufacturer in a personal injury action involving an employee who developed lung fibrosis and underwent a lung transplant after allegedly inhaling fiberglass generated during his work.
- Represented plumbing valve manufacturer in a breach of contract and insurance bad-faith action involving insurer’s duty to defend in underlying product liability suits.
- Represented non-profit policyholders in breach of contract and insurance bad-faith actions involving multiple insurers’ duty to defend in underlying sexual abuse allegation lawsuits.
- Represented owner in construction dispute and related first-party and third-party insurance claims for $152 million in alleged construction defects and resulting damage for multistory building, related transit property and related retail spaces.
- Successfully defended major Japanese manufacturer and several of its U.S. subsidiaries in International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) arbitration proceedings in California involving the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS). The arbitration stemmed from claimed failure of certain critical components manufactured and supplied by the clients, with claims exceeding $7.6 billion. The ICC’s International Court of Arbitration rejected the damages claim and awarded fees and costs as the “prevailing party” in excess of $58 million.
- Successfully defended a major Japanese manufacturer in a $500 million breach of contract and cross-licensing intellectual property dispute before the ICC in Switzerland. The client also recovered more than $12 million in counterclaims.
- Successfully defended two major Japanese manufacturing companies and several of their U.S. subsidiaries in federal and state court cases arising out of claims for forced labor during World War II. The client prevailed at the pleading stage with dismissals of each case.
- Represented clients in $60 million family dispute involving a marriage dissolution, breach of marital fiduciary duties and breach of an oral agreement. The case was resolved by a three-judge panel in a private binding arbitration proceeding.
- Represented a spouse in a two-phase bench trial in a complex marital dispute involving an estate valued in excess of $350 million.
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