Chen v. The Regents Of The University of California
Christopher Faenza and Tim McCormick successfully defended a lawsuit involving allegations of a dangerous condition of public property, obtaining a dismissal in exchange for a waiver of defense costs. Plaintiff was a 21-year-old student at the University of California who rode his bicycle into a drainage catch basin on a landscaped portion of campus and sustained catastrophic injuries rendering him a paraplegic. Plaintiff demanded $26 million from the defendants at mediation. Our client was a landscaping company that constructed a block wall around the catch basin where the plaintiff fell. On the eve of trial, plaintiff effectively conceded the client had no liability to the plaintiff based on the "completed and accepted" doctrine, which shields contractors from liability where a property owner, in this case the University of California, accepts the contractor's completed work.