Daniel Grunfeld

Grunfeld's two major cases this year involved nonprofits trying to give individuals fair access to the court. The commercial litigation attorney was victorious in a patent infringement case and a welfare case, winning millions for his numerous clients.

Grunfeld represented Alfred E. Mann Foundation in a lawsuit that, after six years, finally ended this year with his plaintiff receiving $131 million from Cochlear Corp., who was accused of using the foundation's patented cochlear implants without permission.

"I wholeheartedly believed in the client and what it does," Grunfeld said. "AMF is a remarkable nonprofit. It essentially takes medical devices and flips them, and it uses proceeds to make more medical devices. How do you not represent a client like that?"

As a result of the Central District Court in Los Angeles ruling Cochlear Corp. infringed on two cochlear implant technology patents owned by AMF, Grunfeld won his client a $131.2 million verdict after Alfred E. Mann Foundation for Scientific Research et al. v. Cochlear Corp. et al., CV07-08108, (C.D. Cal., filed Dec. 13, 2007).

Grunfeld also represented residents whose welfare benefits were cut off by Los Angeles County for miniscule reasons like missing an appointment due to a late bus. The county was accused of failing to give enough notice of a stop in benefits amid a recession-induced surplus of applications. Aleah Guillory, et al. v. County of Los Angeles, BC541823 (filed April 8, 2014).

Nonprofits Public Counsel and Inner City Law Center accused the county of revoking benefits from applicants who didn't know their benefits were stopped since they didn't have a mailing address or could reach the social services district office to receive mail. The county settled for almost $8 million with paying the past benefits to the 106,000 impacted applicants. A final hearing is scheduled this fall.

"What was taking place was wrong," Grunfeld said of the pro bono case he took part in as a board member of Public Counsel. "I've been a proponent all my life, and I saw this opportunity to help people who didn't have a voice." His proponent nature, he said, comes from growing up with a diplomat father and a lawyer mother in Israel and Ethiopia.

Grunfeld is now working on pending cases for Kia Motors.

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