Elizabeth J. Cabraser

Working remotely and connecting by Zoom is the way to keep litigation in progress for now, but Cabraser is eager to get back to court.

"I can't tell you how much I miss 450 Golden Gate Avenue," she said, referring to the San Francisco address of Northern District headquarters.

"These judges are leaders. I'm very impressed with how the Northern District and SF Superior Court courts are working through the crisis. It's good to see at least one branch of government functioning well."

The Leiff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein founder is getting set to extend her role as a key player in the multidistrict opioid litigation, after the Ohio district judge overseeing the massive case assigned one of several bellwether trials to U.S. District Judge Charles R. Breyer of San Francisco.

"Judge [Dan A.] Polster in Ohio wants to have multiple examples of what these trials will look like," Cabraser said. "The issues here are public nuisance and civil RICO claims involving California's unfair competition law and false advertising statutes." The trial is expected to be heard partly by a jury and partly by the judge.

Cabraser is on the plaintiffs' executive committee overseeing the national litigation, and she has clients of her own in the mix including the City and County of San Francisco and Indian tribes. In the trial to be held before Breyer she's partnering with San Francisco City Attorney Dennis J. Herrera. City and County of San Francisco v. Purdue Pharma LP, 3:18-cv-07591 (N.D. Cal., filed Dec. 12, 2018).

"The crisis arose from the opioid manufacturers' deliberate and deceptive misinformation campaign to increase prescriptions and sales of opioids" begins the plaintiffs' opposition to a defense motion to dismiss the case, filed in May.

On the plaintiffs' team are former San Francisco city attorney Louise H. Renne of Renne Public Law Group, David S. Casey Jr. of Casey Gerry Schenk Francavilla Blatt & Penfield LLP and others.

"Some of us represented San Francisco back in the tobacco litigation days," Cabraser said. "We got the band back together." Breyer has yet to set a trial date.

It was in Breyer's courtroom that Cabraser scored her recent significant wins for plaintiffs in the massive Volkswagen "clean diesel' litigation. In March that case came nearly to a close when the judge awarded millions of dollars in fees and costs in the part of the matter devoted to claims that Volkswagen misrepresented to consumers the mileage its cars would get. In re Volkswagen "Clean Diesel" Marketing, Sales Practices, and Products Liability Litigation, 15-MD-02672 (N.D. Cal., filed Dec. 8, 2015).

"Clean they weren't," Cabraser observed of the vehicles at the heart of the case. "These days I'm driving an electric Jaguar."

-- John Roemer