Robert A. Naeve

Naeve spent a good portion of his practice time in 2016 representing and advising Beth Jay, the former principal counsel to the state’s chief justice, as Jay fought claims by former State Bar Executive Director Joseph L. Dunn that she improperly figured in his November 2014 termination.

Jay strongly denied Dunn’s allegation that she misrepresented his comments about the chief justice’s position regarding the sale of the bar’s San Francisco office. “Dunn has not alleged and cannot allege that the State Bar terminated his employment because of anything Ms. Jay said or did,” read Jay’s dismissal motion, drafted by Naeve.

The case ended with a bittersweet outcome for Naeve’s client Jan. 18 when JAMS arbitrator Edward A. Infante dismissed Dunn’s intentional interference with contractual relations claim against her. “It is a total vindication of Ms. Jay’s position,” Naeve said when the decision was announced.

Still, the case was painful. “You see the personal impact a lawsuit can have on a litigant,” Naeve said of Jay. “Usually, it is big companies we represent going at one another, making risk assessments. By contrast, this was a pretty vindictive lawsuit.”

To get his client dismissed from the suit, Naeve conducted multiple discovery battles with Dunn’s powerhouse counsel Mark J. Geragos. He took depositions of most of the State Bar’s board of trustees, prepared and submitted a comprehensive motion for summary judgment and represented Jay in the arbitration itself, where Jay testified as a witness and not as a respondent. Dunn v. State Bar of California, JAMS Ref. No. 1100083130 (filed Feb. 12, 2016).

The Superior Court confirmed the dismissal May 15. Dunn v. State Bar of California, BC563715 (L.A. Super. Ct. April 4, 2017).

“Beth Jay never expected to be on the receiving end of a lawsuit,” Naeve said. “My only regret is that it took so long. Judge Infante is a very careful arbitrator. He wanted to make sure Dunn and Geragos had a chance to prove up what they claimed. It proved to be a goose egg. My client is very relieved. She’s a proud woman, and this is not how she wanted to end a 33-year career working for three chief justices at the Supreme Court.”

Meanwhile, Naeve represents McDonald’s Corp. and other clients in Americans with Disabilities Act cases. “The work has expanded exponentially,” he said. “These are not your father’s kind of cases anymore, where you’d slap a retailer with an accessibility suit if there were the wrong kind of signs in the parking lot.” Now it’s often website and mobile app accessibility claims at issue. “Or should we have to make pill bottles talk,” Naeve said. “Media accessibility remains an area of significant uncertainty.”

— John Roemer