Robyn C. Crowther

Crowther has led all-women teams of lawyers in a half-dozen trials and arbitrations over the last few years, and she had no trouble putting them together.

“It has not necessarily been intentional, nor has it been hard,” she said. “There are plenty of women who have the ability to [go to trial]. And it doesn’t take a whole lot of effort to make it happen.”

In her most recent trial, Crowther fell into having an all-woman team. She took over a five-year-old personal injury case three months before trial to replace the former lead counsel due to an emergency. After a 15-day trial this year, she and her two colleagues succeeded in holding the jury verdict down to $2.7 million, well below the plaintiff’s $25 million claim and $4.9 million offer. Jimenez v. Badio, BC595777, (L.A. Super. Ct, filed Sept. 29, 2015).

For a Financial Industry Regulatory Authority arbitration, Crowther worked with two separate all-women teams because she changed firms while the case was pending. The arbitration panel also changed after the lead arbitrator died between the first hearing and the second hearing a year later, she said.

The reconstituted panel granted an award against Crowther’s client last summer, but the amount was less that the claimant had spent bringing the case, she said. Laguna Financial Group Inc. v. Charles Schwab & Co. Inc., 16-03252 (FINRA Off. Disp. Res., filed Nov.4, 2016)

Since the pandemic hit, Crowther has focused on pro bono work to support women sexually assaulted in college. She and co-counsel are fighting a judge’s decision to reverse a school’s findings against a woman’s alleged assailant without letting the woman participate in the man’s court challenge. Doe v. Regents of the University of California, RG18888616, (Alameda Sup. Ct., filed Jan. 10, 2018).

She also is advising the nonprofit Legal Momentum about how to challenge new Title IX regulations the federal Department of Education implemented in August.

“Approaching [one of these cases] as though it’s a criminal defense proceeding is perhaps not the best model,” she said.

— Don DeBenedictis