Consider What’s at Stake. Objectives Matter. Results Matter.

Solutions start with viewing the situation differently. I have been producing results for nearly 25 years in Admiralty and Maritime.

I’m your outside counsel that looks at your legal matter through the lens of your business goals. If you want the deal... I’m a dealmaker. If you don’t want the deal... I’m a deal-breaker.

My Results: Obtained a large confidential settlement for a small cruise line, which also required the defendant manufacturers to agree to a Manufacturer’s Support Agreement to support the errant product for the life of the vessel.

Task: Litigation against manufacturers of a cruise ship’s propulsion system that broke down on 2 separate occasions due to design defects.

Stakes: A vessel that had useless propulsion that was bound to keep breaking down, which would result in cancelled cruises, expensive repairs and continued loss of goodwill from customers.

Outcome: After defeating defendants’ Motion to Dismiss seeking to force the cruise line to arbitrate the case under the build contract, to which the defendants were not a party, the parties reached a confidential settlement.

My Results: Obtained defense verdict.

Task: Defend a casualty which involved a tug and barge that lost 22 containers overboard from its transit between Jacksonville and Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Stakes: Damages of over $1 million.

Outcome: Defendant stevedore brought in my client as a third-party defendant, attempting to hold my client responsible for poor welds on the barge. Court found that the stevedore failed to meet its burden of proof and held the vessel owner 60% responsible for the loss and the stevedore 40% responsible for the loss, with my client recovering its taxable costs from the stevedore, since it was a prevailing party in the litigation.

My Results: No coverage on marine insurance claim.

Task: Bring a declaratory judgment action against an insured of a 90-foot Sunseeker to have the court rule that there was no coverage.

Stakes: The vessel sank in calm waters and was a constructive total loss amounting to $4 million. If I would have lost the declaratory judgment action, the client would have had to pay the loss plus the insured’s attorney’s fees.

Outcome: The court found no coverage, insured appealed. The appellate court remanded for additional fact finding. The trial court made additional fact finding and found no coverage, insured appealed. The appellate court upheld the ruling.

My Results:  Got first-class yacht builder to agree to install, at its sole risk and expense, stern thrusters on a vessel that had, what I alleged to be a design defect.

Task: On the yacht’s maiden voyage, the yacht suffered a water ingression of over 15 MT of seawater into her side tender bays. I had to negotiate with yacht builder to install, at its expense, a way for the vessel to not flood when launching tenders, as they could not be safely launched or recovered in anything but minimum wave conditions, in protected anchorages as the tender bays and launching systems were constructed to a defective design.

Stakes: Get the yacht manufacturer with difficult contract terms to agree to fix a €54 million yacht to make the yacht safe for tender operations.

Outcome: I positioned the case to say that the yacht could not safely launch or recover her tenders in anything but minimum wave conditions, in protected anchorages as the tender bays and launching systems were constructed to a defective design. The builder agreed, at its sole cost and expense, to install the stern thruster and to provide additional "discounts" to the owner to resolve the operational situation with the yacht. This has increased the value of the yacht considerably.

My Results: Obtained a TRO such that the vessel owner voluntarily agreed to place the proceeds of the sale of a vessel into the registry of the federal court in the amount of $2.323 million.

Task: Find a way to seize the vessel such that a fraudulent sale of the vessel would be stalled long enough to position the case so that the proceeds of the sale would be deposited into the court registry and utilized as part of a larger RICO claim against the fraudster.

Stakes: The vessel was in the process of being sold and potentially, fleeing the jurisdiction.

Outcome: I first filed a maritime lien against the vessel, after my client obtained an assignment from the lien holder and seized the vessel. I then filed a larger Rule D action, alleging that the vessel was purchased with ill-gotten gains. With the agreement of my client, the fraudster was allowed to sell the vessel but was required to deposit the proceeds into the registry of the court. At the hearing on the arrest, the fraudster admitted to misappropriating the funds, not realizing that this would result in the funds being requested by the state court handling the RICO claim.