Stuart Gross Named A 2013 Super Lawyer In Business Litigation by Super Lawyers
SAN FRANCISCO, August 2013: Super Lawyers has named Stuart Gross to its list of Super Lawyers in Northern California. Stuart was specifically named a Super Lawyer in the area of Business Litigation. According to Super Lawyers, the designation of Super Lawyer is given only to attorneys “who have attained a high-degree of peer recognition and professional achievement. The selection process is multi-phased and includes independent research, peer nominations and peer evaluations.” Stuart was previously named a Rising Star by Super Lawyers in 2010, 2011, and 2012.
San Francisco Bay Herring Fishermen Bring Suit To Halt Federal Overreach And Preserve The Nation’s Last Urban Commercial Fishery
SAN FRANCISCO, April 18, 2013 – Herring fishermen filed suit today in San Francisco federal court against the Department of the Interior (“DOI”), National Park Service (“NPS”) and others to halt an unprecedented and extra-legal attempt by the federal government to prohibit commercial herring fishing in waters abutting the Golden Gate National Recreation Area (“GGNRA”) in the San Francisco Bay and preserve the nation’s last urban fishery.
“For over forty years the San Francisco Bay herring fishery and the GGNRA have existed side-by-side,” Stuart Gross of Gross Law, attorney for the fishermen stated. “Now, inexplicably, the NPS has asserted jurisdiction over the waters abutting the GGNRA and prohibited fishing in those waters. Quite simply, the NPS has no legal authority to do so.”
As explained in the Complaint, the GGNRA Enabling Act, which established the GGNRA, explicitly confines the NPS’ authority in the San Francisco Bay to the “the lands, waters and interests therein acquired” by the NPS’ parent, the DOI. The DOI never acquired any interests in the waters in question that would give the NPS the authority to prohibit commercial fishing or navigation in those waters.
According to the Complaint, the NPS has claimed authority over the waters based on two legislative grants of rights to bottom lands in the Bay made by the California legislature to the U.S. military in the 1800s and a lease from the State in the 1980s.
“There are a couple of major problems with this claim,” Gross explained. “First, as a matter of basic California constitutional law, when California grants property rights to bottom lands under navigable waters, it does not, and cannot, grant the right to exclude others from fishing or navigating in the waters above. Second, the legislative grant on which the NPS seeks to most heavily rely, the Act of March 9, 1897, was repealed by the California legislature in 1953. It thus cannot be used as the basis for anything.”
Gross went on, “We raised this with the NPS and the DOI in an effort to avoid filing litigation. In reaction, they then pointed to provisions of the GGNRA Enabling Act establishing the boundaries of the GGNRA. However, the GGNRA Enabling Act makes clear that these boundaries merely define a geographic area in which the DOI can acquire lands and waters and interest therein. By drawing these boundaries on a map, Congress did not, by fiat, seize rights over the waters and lands within those boundaries and give them to the DOI to administer.”
As alleged in the Complaint, the NPS’ decision to prohibit herring fishing in the waters abutting the GGNRA is not only extra-legal, it threatens the last urban fishery in the nation, upsets the careful management of the fishery by California, and harms the Bay’s herring resource.
John Mellor, Vice President of the San Francisco Herring Association, explained, “Herring fishermen are all small independent operators, many, in fact, work in husband and wife teams. By prohibiting fishing in these areas, the NPS is putting at risk this fishery and the livelihoods of those who depend on it.”
Nick Sohrakoff, Chairman of the Director’s Herring Advisory Committee and President of the San Francisco Bay Herring Research Association, pointed out that the preventing fishermen from harvesting herring in waters abutting the GGNRA harms the Bay’s herring stock:
“Herring come into the Bay to spawn in several waves during a season. As the season progresses, younger and smaller herring enter the bay. Fishermen are only allowed to collectively catch a certain quota of herring set in advance of each season by the California Fish and Game Commission. In recent years and at the request of the fishermen the quota has been set at roughly 5% of the total spawning biomass or weight of the expected returning herring (world wide, sustainable exploitation rates are 15 to 20%). When fishermen are not allowed to catch fish that happen to spawn in waters off the GGNRA, the quota takes longer to fill or doesn’t get filled at all. As a result, fishermen are out on water for days or weeks longer and are potentially throwing nets on younger fish, which are hard to differentiate from the larger older fish. This can be bad for the resource. A quota fishery is designed to allow an acceptable exploitation rate. San Francisco Bay’s extremely conservative quota is designed for the herring to be caught as efficiently and quickly as possible. When the quota is filled, the fishermen are finished and the successive waves of fish, including the younger/smaller fish, enter the bay to spawn unmolested and this is definitely good for the resource.”
Gross added, “The Bay’s herring fishermen are some of its most important and contentious stewards. They have worked cooperatively with the Fish and Game Commission and the Department of Fish and Wildlife to make the fishery a model for sustainable management in the country, if not the world. By prohibiting fishing in these waters, the NPS is not only overstepping its authority, it’s disrupting that management and threatening the resource it is claiming to protect.”
The lawsuit is titled, San Francisco Herring Association v. United States Dep’t of the Interior, No. 13-1750 (N.D. Cal.) et al. and was filed in the San Francisco Courthouse of the District Court of the Northern District of California.
Court Grants Plaintiffs’ Motion for Summary Judgment Sending Richardson Grove Highway Expansion Back to Drawing Board
SAN FRANCISCO, April 4, 2012 — Northern District of California Judge William Alsup today ordered Caltrans to redo critical aspects of its environmental analysis for a controversial project that would widen and realign Highway 101 through the ancient redwoods of Richardson Grove State Park in Humboldt County. Gross Law and co-counsel have sued Caltrans, on behalf of the Center for Biological Diversity, the Environmental Protection Information Center, California for Alternatives to Toxics, and Humboldt residents, alleging Caltrans violated federal environmental laws and ignored the mortal threats the proposed project poses to ancient redwoods in the park and its environs.
In granting Plaintiffs’ Motion for Summary Judgment filed by Gross Law and co-counsel on behalf of Plaintiffs, Judge Alsup “there are a number of discrepancies and omissions [in Caltrans’ environmental assessment] that raise serious questions about whether Caltrans truly took a ‘hard look’ at the effects of the project and made an informed decision.” Comparing the data in Caltrans’ environmental analysis to that which Gross Law and co-counsel compiled, with the assistance of a redwood tree physiology expert, and presented to the Court, Judge Alsup found that Caltrans had fundamentally failed in its obligations to premise its environment analysis upon accurate data. Judge Alsup, in fact, found that Caltrans’ analysis of project’s impacts both as to particular trees and to “the grove as a whole, are based off of false data.” These “errors in the data,” Judge Alsup found, “are so implausible that they could not be ascribed to a difference in view or the product of agency expertise.”
Finding that the errors in the data ultimately “frustrate effective judicial review” of Caltrans’ actions, Judge Alsup remanded to Caltrans with the mandate that Caltrans redo its environmental analysis using accurate data, analyzing the potential impact of the project on each old growth redwood in its path, and “giv[ing] serious consideration to the other significant arguments made by plaintiffs.”
Previously, Judge Alsup granted Plaintiffs’ Motion for a Preliminary Injunction, filed by Gross Law and co-counsel. All further work on the project remains enjoined.
The lawsuit is captioned Bair et al. v. Caltrans et al., No. 10-04360-WHA (N.D. Cal.).
Company Assigns Seed Investor, Represented By Gross Law, Pursuit In New York Of Claims Against Perpetrators Of Massive Short & Distort Stock Market Manipulation Scheme
New York, March 27, 2012 - Gerova Financial Group Ltd. (”Gerova”) has assigned to Noble Investments Limited (”Noble”), a seed investor in the company represented by Gross Law, claims against Dalrymple Finance LLC, Keith Dalrymple, Victoria Dalrymple and others that participated in a devastating campaign of misinformation and naked short selling against the company. Before Defendants’ attack, Gerova traded on the NYSE and had hundreds of million dollars in market capitalization.
The lawsuit alleges that the Defendants engaged in a “short and distort” or “reverse pump and dump” scheme that had the purpose and effect of artificially depressing the share price of Gerova and interfering with three major previously announced acquisitions by Gerova. The complaint alleges the Defendants amassed huge short positions in Gerova’s stock in late 2010 and early 2011 (including many illegal naked positions), immediately before the company was to complete the three acquisitions. The Defendants then launched a coordinated attack on the company’s reputation, using Forbes.com, zerohedge.com, and other means to spread false and defamatory information about the company. As a result, Gerova lost approximately $800 million in market capital in less than two months, and investors in Gerova, including Noble, suffered massive losses. Noble’s shares, for which it paid $5.75 million as one of the company's seed investors, were worth approximately $17 million prior to initiation of the attack and are now virtually worthless.
Noble originally filed an action against the Defendants in San Francisco Superior Court. In response, Defendants, two of whom claim to be residents of Bulgaria, filed sworn declarations purportedly in support of efforts to defeat the suit containing a treasure trove of useful admissions, including several strongly supporting an assertion of personal jurisdiction over the Defendants by New York courts. Utilizing Stuart Gross’ capability to practice in New York, as well as California, Noble dismissed the California complaint and refilled a complaint in New York Supreme Court bolstered by facts admitted by the Defendants and the claims of Gerova assigned to it.
Class Certified In Constitutional Challenge Of Nonresident Fees Charged For California Commercial Fishing Licenses, Permits & Registrations – Stuart Gross Appointed Class Counsel
SAN FRANCISCO, March 13, 2012 – Judge Donna M. Ryu of the Northern District of California issued an opinion certifying a class of nonresident commercial fishermen in a case challenging the constitutionality of the State of California’s over two decades long practice of charging nonresidents several times more for four types of licenses, permits, and registrations required to commercially fish in California waters, and appointed Stuart Gross class counsel. The certified class is defined as:
All individuals residing in the United States who, during the period beginning on May 18, 2009 through present (“Class Period”), purchased or renewed a California commercial fishing license, permit, or registration, and were required to pay a non-resident fee in connection with such purchase or renewal.
In reaching her decision to certify the class, Judge Ryu found that the class satisfied all of the prerequisites for Federal Rule of Procedure 23(a) and fell solidly within the contours of Federal Rule of Procedure 23(b)(2). Judge Ryu rejected the State’s argument that the class failed to meet the commonality requirements of Federal Rule of Procedure 23(a)(2) in light of the Supreme Court’s decision in Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. v. Dukes, 131 S. Ct. 2541, (2011), agreeing with Plaintiffs that common constitutional questions were at the core of all of Plaintiffs’ claims. Judge Ryu further found that the claims sought to be pursued on behalf of the class “conform[ed] to what the Ninth Circuit has called ‘the classic type of action envisioned by the drafters of Rule 23 to be brought under subdivision (b)(2).’” (quoting Elliott v. Weinberger, 564 F.2d 1219, 1229 (9th Cir. 1977)).
In appointing Stuart Gross class counsel, Judge Ryu recognized Stuart’s “experience in handling class actions, complex litigation, and natural resource litigation” and the “substantial work” done by him “in identifying and pursuing Plaintiffs’ claims,” and found that he “has demonstrated knowledge of the applicable law and the ability to commit sufficient resources to represent the class.”
The challenged nonresidents fees are charged by California for personal commercial fishing licenses, commercial boat registrations, Dungeness crab vessel permits, and herring gillnet permits. The challenges are brought under Article IV’s PrivilConstitution.