Top Plaintiff's Verdict by Dollar: Grow Land and Water LLC v. McCarthy Family Farms

Attorneys for Grow Land and Water LLC scored King County's largest verdict ever last year, winning $128.6 million in a lawsuit involving breach of contract and intentional interference claims. However, punitive damages were later reduced, making the final award amount $79.75 million. An appeal was filed last August.

The case involved one of California's most precious commodities - water and the rights to it. Grow Land and Water LLC v. McCarthy Family Farms, 09C0378 (Kings Super. Ct., filed Dec. 11, 2009).

Plaintiffs argued in the three-month civil trial that in 2007, McCarthy Family Farms had agreed in writing to sell to Grow Land and Water Co., a division of Los Angeles-based Grow Holdings, two parcels of property called Liberty Ranch.Â

After realizing the value of the water rights it had agreed to sell, McCarthy Family Farms surreptitiously transferred the property to Sandridge Partners in violation of the option to purchase agreements, plaintiff's attorneys argued.Â

Liberty Ranch in Kings County consists of more than 34 square miles of fallow agricultural land, with access to a considerable amount of water.

"With the extraordinary increase in the value of water, the plaintiffs asserted the defendants ignored their contractual obligations out of greed," said Phillip A. Baker, co-lead for Grow and a partner with Baker, Keener & Nahra LLP.

Baker attributes his success to repeatedly using the testimony of the three defendants - Sean McCarthy and Patrick McCarthy of McCarthy Family Farms and John Vidovich of Sandridge Partners Inc. - against one another.

The initial award was more than $100 million more than the largest previous verdict ever handed down in Kings County, according to Baker. The judge later dropped punitive damages from $55 million to $3 million.

The defendants were represented by Bob H. Joyce of LeBeau-Thelen and Marshall C. Whitney of McCormick Barstow LLP. Neither returned calls for comment.

- DEIRDRE NEWMAN