Pedaling Justice

By Emmett Berg

Tt?s been ten years since Los Angeles attorney Gary Brustin narrowed his general personal injury practice to focus exclusively on representing bicyclist plaintiffs?but getting out in front of the PI peloton has been no quick climb.

During his 15 years handling general PI cases, Brustin occasionally represented cyclists. But he eventually decided to get ?more aggressive? and make them the core of his practice. Today, he even sponsors a road-racing team of cyclists and travels the state speaking to cycling groups about safety and the law, meeting clients in the Bay Area weekly or more often.

A 1975 graduate of UC Hastings College of the Law, the 59-year-old Brustin?s own favorite cycling route is a 2,500-foot climb up Piuma Road above the Malibu coast. Loath to cite damage sums as a measure for his practice, he does take pride in a ?breakthrough? arbitration when he represented an injured cyclist in Pomona eight years ago.

?I was always getting hit with comparative negligence,? Brustin says. But in this case, the arbitrator found the motorist 100 percent at fault.

Demand for Brustin?s services is growing. Each year from 2002 to 2006, between 10,000 and 11,000 people were injured or killed on bicycles in California, according to the Highway Patrol; fatalities numbered 155 in 2006, up from 120 in 2002. And even though plenty of the bicyclists badly injured in collisions today are younger, well-educated riders, plaintiffs still lose in two of every three cases that go to verdict in state court, according to Brustin. One explanation: Jury pools are dominated by motorists who have seen bicyclists recklessly flout traffic laws, says Kenneth Gack, a mediator with JAMS in San Francisco who has worked with Brustin and attests that the attorney?s passion for cycling does not compromise his professional demeanor.

Furthermore, because Brustin chooses his clients carefully, he manages to prevail in two-thirds of the court cases he takes to trial. And in alternative dispute resolution, where the mediators and arbitrators are often retired judges getting reacquainted with their bicycles for exercise, Brustin cites a 90 percent ?win? rate.

?The first secret to anyone?s success in tort law is picking the right cases,? says Sacramento defense counsel David Brown, who opposed Brustin once in a court case that went to mediation. ?And I?ve done quite a [few] bicycle cases where I?m in court and the plaintiff?s lawyer [thinks] he has a winner, but I?m looking at it and thinking, ?Gary Brustin probably wouldn?t have taken that case.? ?

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