Eisner Gorin LLP

Longtime trial attorney Dmitry Gorin wasn't much of a public speaker during his early days at Fairfax High School in Los Angeles.

The son of Russian immigrants who fled the former Soviet Union in the late 1970s, Gorin didn't speak any English when he arrived in the U.S., and in junior high, he figured he'd be an engineer. Those career goals changed, however, after Gorin joined Fairfax's mock trial team and got his first exposure to advocacy.

"Ever since high school, I just wanted to become a trial lawyer," the Eisner Gorin LLP partner said.

Gorin later attended UCLA School of Law and worked for more than a decade at the Los Angeles County district attorney's office before moving into private practice and refocusing on criminal defense in 2006. Over his 25-year career, Gorin has litigated approximately 100 jury trials.

"I just enjoy the work and being in a courtroom so much," Gorin explained. "Be it a smaller case -- say a suppression motion in a drug case where people's rights are violated to cross examining the detective in a murder case -- I get the same rush of just being able to make the argument. ... Standing up and advocating, I just get a rush from that."

Gorin teamed up 15 years ago with Alan Eisner, who had known him as a prosecutor and been impressed by his work in court.

"I would see him in the trenches," Eisner said, noting the two never had a case against one another. "He was a strong prosecutor, a creative prosecutor and yet a caring prosecutor. ... When one day he mentioned something to me about going into private practice, I said 'Let's talk.'"

Eisner completed his degree at Loyola Law School in 1985, and after passing the bar, he worked from 1987 to 1992 at the Los Angeles County public defender's office before starting his own practice. Today, Eisner and Gorin are both California State Bar certified criminal law specialists, taking on clients facing everything from drunken driving charges to murder.

"I am very proud of our profession," Eisner said. "People come to you when they're in their most vulnerable time and their most fearful time. ... They were arrested, and they're in a fog. They're in a paralysis, and you have to be a good listener and process their concerns and hear them."

Eisner Gorin has taken on a number of high profile clients over the years, representing well-known names such as comedian Kathy Griffin and for a time Russian boxer Sergey Kovalev. The three-attorney shop has also represented other headline grabbing defendants, including a UCLA professor facing child pornography charges and the former head of a Mexican megachurch, Naason Joaquin Garcia, who was arrested in 2019 on charges of human trafficking and rape of a minor.

Although Eisner Gorin typically handles high stakes criminal litigation, the firm's clients don't all face such intense media scrutiny, according to Gorin.

"Most of my clients are folks from good families, and maybe there's some mental health issues, maybe there's addiction issues," Gorin explained. "Maybe they just had a bad time in their life, a bad divorce, perhaps, or some government investigation about white collar crime, and they've never had problems ever before. By solving the criminal situation, you're really helping them move forward with their lives, and it feels really gratifying to do that."

Retired Los Angeles County Judge Michael A. Latin, who's known Eisner since the two were in law school and was Gorin's high school mock trial team coach, described both attorneys as excellent advocates and "just really good people."

In 2008, Eisner and Gorin tried a murder case before Latin, garnering a not guilty by reason of insanity jury verdict for a client who slit another man's throat in a Van Nuys strip club.

"They were a terrific team," Latin insisted. "They presented a psychiatric defense that was very effective that the jury believed and I believed, as well. I would have found the same thing the jury did."

Latin also worked with Gorin at the DA's office and described him as really smart and tenacious, adding with a chuckle that Gorin is certainly the more demonstrative partner on the Eisner Gorin team.

"Dmitry finds things other people wouldn't find because he'll really dig," Latin said. "And he's likeable in front of a jury. Both he and Alan are just really, really nice guys, and that comes through to a jury, so they're both really effective advocates."

White collar defense attorney Eddie A. Jauregui, a former assistant U.S. attorney who opposed Eisner on many federal cases, described him as a straight shooter and "an unfailingly polite guy."

"Alan's a very strong adversary for his clients," Jauregui said. "But he's just not the kind of person that's going to be intemperate. He's always going to be respectful of the entire process."

Jauregui said he last squared off against Eisner on a procurement fraud case but said he opposed him on a number of federal drug cases over the years, and Jauregui was quick to note Eisner is well respected by other federal prosecutors.

"I certainly would never underestimate Alan," he said. "But I knew whether the case was contentious or not, whether the case was going to trial or not, he was the kind of person I could trust."

Both Eisner and Gorin were, meanwhile, quick to mention just how grateful they were to have landed the other as a partner, each marveling for a moment at their respective fortune.

"He's fearless," Eisner said of Gorin. "He's got guts, and you need to have a lot of guts in our job. ... I'm proud he's my partner. I really am. I feel really lucky. I've been married 26 years, and that's the most important relationship I have. But next to that, it's definitely your law partner, right?"

--Shane Nelson