Partnership Disputes

The Firm has extensive experience handling a wide variety of partnership disputes, which are often quite contentious. We are frequently hired by departing partners or dissolving partnerships, including law firms, because of our expertise with the unique issues of partnership law. From our experience in this area, we understand the sensitive nature of these disputes, and are able to advise clients on the many issues with which they are faced, including advising our clients how to appropriately deal with sensitive trade secret and proprietary information of a partnership, how to ensure an orderly winding-up of a partnership's affairs, how to implement strategies to allow some subset of a partnership to continue business operations, how to protect the rights of partners vis-à-vis each other and the partnership, and how to handle the confidential and sensitive nature of these disputes from the standpoint of competitors, clients of the partnership, and public and media relations.

The following are examples of partnership disputes handled by the Firm:

• Advice to a variety of lawyers regarding the handling of disputes within, and breakups of, their law firms.
• A dispute involving three named partners against another named partner over issues stemming from the breakup of their law firm. Our clients' analysis of the parties' buyout rights prevailed in a binding arbitration proceeding.
• A dispute between an accounting firm and one of its former partners over that partner's claimed buy-out rights. This matter entailed the defense of the accounting firm against the fraud and contract claims alleged by its former partner and advice regarding how to handle that former partner's veiled threats to impair the firm's reputation with respect to the quality of work performed by that firm's remaining accountants.
• Representation of the limited partners of a commercial real estate development against the general partner, a national home builder. Our prosecution of the limited partners' claims in a month-long arbitration resulted in an award for our clients.
• The Firm represented two partners of a partnership that developed mixed use properties in San Diego in pursuing their rights against other partners who excluded the opportunity to develop a hotel from the partnership. Shortly before trial, a substantial seven-figure settlement was negotiated in favor of our clients.
• One of our partners has served as an expert witness in partnership litigation. His opinions on unique issues of partnership law were upheld and adopted by the Fourth District Court of Appeal in handing down an important Opinion on partnership law issues.