Sarah R. London

London said one of the proudest moments of her career came during a trial for a tobacco injury class action case when one of the opposing lawyers and the judge dubbed her “the big hammer.”

Her staff later gave her a hammer as a memento, which she said signifies her passion, tenacity and preparedness.

“It was a telling moment...for a relatively young woman lawyer to be considered the ‘big hammer’ against these big tobacco company defendants,” she said. “I’ve never ever stopped being myself in court...I bring my own experience, my own analogies to the world.”

From 2012 to 2016, London was trial counsel on nearly a dozen tobacco cases in Florida, where she represented family members who lost loved ones to nicotine addiction or individuals living with nicotine addiction against tobacco giants including R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. and its subsidiary Lorillard Tobacco Co. along with Philip Morris.

Over the last year, London has had success at the appellate level with these cases, where verdicts in the class actions were upheld.

“That’s been deeply gratifying, to see our client finally get paid after all of these years — and, I mean, decades of waiting for justice,” she said. “So it’s been very gratifying to see that process finally come to an end for so many who had been waiting so long.”

She said she is also very proud of her role as one of three interim class counsel on a newer case involving the Pacific Fertility Center in San Francisco. One of the facility’s storage tanks had a liquid nitrogen failure, which damaged thousands of stored eggs and embryos. E. v. Pacific Fertility Center, et al., 3:18-cv-01586 (N.D. Cal., filed March 13, 2013).

“The tank failed in which the eggs and embryos were stored, so we’re representing these women and their families who have lost eggs and embryos or had those eggs and embryos compromised, and are suffering tremendous anxiety and heartache over the loss,” she said. She added that the loss, or expected loss, of eggs and embryos contributed to uncertainty to whether the families could preserve their reproductive futures moving forward.

London partially credits her body of success to the deep institutional support she received at the start of her career at Lieff Cabraser. Before working as an attorney, London was a community organizer and worked for Planned Parenthood. She said her background as an organizer grounds her current work.

“I am deeply proud of all of the work that I have done, particularly as a trial lawyer,” London said. “I’ve had the great fortune and opportunity to represent a number of families at trial and to help tell their stories to a jury and to advocate zealously on their behalf before, during and after trial.”

— Caroline Hart