Judge Larson brings more than 21 years of litigation experience, including serving as Assistant US Attorney in the Criminal Division in Los Angeles where he led 24 criminal trials and received the US Department of Justice Director’s Award for Superior Performance. A respected and accomplished jurist, he served as a federal judge for nearly a decade, first as a US Magistrate Judge and then, upon elevation, as a US District Judge in the Central District, where he adjudicated over a thousand federal cases.

Since leaving the federal bench to resume private practice, Judge Larson has quickly emerged as one of California’s go-to litigators in white collar and commercial litigation defense, with a string of dismissals in highly complex criminal and civil matters.

Representative matters include:

• Successfully defending a real estate developer in state criminal and civil cases and a related federal investigation by the FBI and IRS involving corruption allegations concerning a $102 million settlement that ended a four-year legal battle. Successes to date have included demurrers being sustained on five of seven counts in the state criminal indictment. This high-profile case was described by California’s then Attorney General Jerry Brown as the most significant public corruption case in the state’s history.
• Successfully defended a high-profile, national fast food chain in a class action lawsuit of over 17,000 plaintiffs seeking $51 million in damages under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA). A successful motion for summary judgment resulted in a complete judgment in our client’s favor on all claims.
• One of the lead plaintiff attorneys in a widely watched case among the trademark and copyright law bar involving defendants’ unauthorized licensing of movie poster artwork and promotional advertisements for an iconic animated cartoon character.
• Successfully defended an individual accused of engaging in a conspiracy to launder the proceeds of a Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA)-related bribery scheme. Successes included obtaining a Rule 29 judgment of acquittal on the singular substantive count of the federal indictment based on insufficient evidence and a Section 2255 motion vacating the one count of conviction based on the Court’s dismissal of the underlying indictment based on government misconduct, predicated in part on a successful motion to suppress intercepted communications.

As a US District Judge in the Central District, Judge Larson presided over a number of high-profile cases, including United States v. Nazario, a landmark Military Extraterritoriality Jurisdiction Act case involving US Marines accused of manslaughter during the Battle of Fallujah in Iraq, and United States v. Duro, in which he blocked the US Bureau of Indian Affairs’ decade long effort to close down and expel a major migrant worker camp on the Torres Martinez Indian Reservation in the Coachella Valley, home to thousands of migrant farm workers, and turned the operation of the settlement over to a court-appointed receiver. He also negotiated, approved, and supervised the consent decree entered into by the County of San Bernardino in John Doe v. County of San Bernardino, which resulted in systematic reform of educational and therapeutic services for disabled youths within the county juvenile hall system, as well as determined the ownership of the copyrights to the iconic comic strip Superman in Siegel v. Warner Bros. Entertainment, Inc. While serving on the federal bench, Judge Larson also sat by designation on the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, participating in approximately 40 decisions.

Judge Larson shares a strong interest and an active involvement in promoting the rule of law in developing countries. Along with Arent Fox partner Robert O’Brien, he was a founding member of and continues to serve on the executive board of the US Department of State’s Public-Private Partnership for Justice Reform in Afghanistan, traveling to that war-torn nation to meet judges, prosecutors, and other government officials and hosting several Afghan delegations for training in the United States, including the Afghan Women Lawyers Program in 2009 which included meetings with the Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor. While serving as chief of the organized crime section of the US Attorney’s Office in Los Angeles, Judge Larson worked with foreign law enforcement agencies conducting joint training exercises investigations that took him to Russia (including Moscow, Irkutsk, and Vladivostok), Kazakhstan, Estonia, Latvia, Poland, the Ukraine, and South Korea. As a federal judge he was actively involved in promoting the rule of law and combating corruption in Uzbekistan, Croatia, and Rwanda.

Judge Larson is the Distinguished Jurist in Residence and a member of the Board of Visitors at the University of La Verne College of Law, where he has taught classes on federal courts, conflicts of law, civil rights, international law, criminal procedure, and professional responsibility since 2002. Judge Larson was appointed by founding Dean Erwin Chemerinsky to serve on the Dean's Advisory Council for the newly chartered law school at the University of California at Irvine. Judge Larson has taught extensively at various law enforcement academies on money laundering, asset forfeiture, and fraud and banking regulations in the United States, including the FBI National Academy in Quantico, Virginia, as well as overseas in Hungary, Italy, Malta, Republic of China, Australia, and New Zealand. 

Judge Larson’s professional affiliations include:

• American Bar Association, Life Fellow
• Antitrust Litigation Forum, Steering Committee. Cambridge Forums
• Association of Business Trial Lawyers
• Federal Bar Association, Los Angeles, Board of Directors
• Pacific Council on International Policy
• Volunteer Center of Riverside County, Advisory Board

Publications

• “Law Blog Expert Panel: Ex-Judges on Rakoff’s Citi Ruling,” The Wall Street Journal; December 2011
• “Labor Law,” The Guide to Acquisition and Management of a U.S. Business, Eurostudy Publishing Co. Ltd.; 1991, co-author
• “Lawyers of Earlier Times Teach Lessons that Endure,” Student Lawyer, American Bar Association; May 2003
• “The Road to Tashkent,” Riverside County Lawyer, Riverside Co. Bar Association; January 2004
• “On Being an American,” Riverside County Lawyer, Riverside Co. Bar Association; June 2007
• “This Court Will Not Close Dureville”: Balancing Tribal Sovereignty and Residents’ Rights in United States v. Duro, Clearinghouse Review Journal of Poverty Law and Policy, Jan-Feb. 2010, pp. 491-494
• “Don’t Forget Afghanistan’s Justice System,” CBS News.com, February 17, 2010

Awards

• Director’s Award for Superior Performance as an Assistant United States Attorney, U.S. Department of Justice (1996)
• Los Angeles Daily Journal, “Top 20 Lawyers Under 40” (2004)
• Erwin Chemerinsky Defender of the Constitution Award, Federal Bar Association (2009)
• Irish America Magazine, “Legal 100” (2009, 2010, 2011, 2012)
• Lawdragon 500 (2010, 2011, 2012)
• Amar Es Entregarse Award, Diocese of San Bernardino (2011)
• Legal 500 US (2012)
• SuperLawyer (2012, 2013)
• Western San Bernardino County Bar Association – Jennifer Brook Lawyer of the Year (2012)

Press Coverage

• “This Court Will Not Close Dureville”:  Balancing Tribal Sovereignty and Residents’ Rights in United States v. Duro, Clearinghouse REVIEW Journal of Poverty Law and Policy, Jan.-Feb. 2010, pp. 491-494.