Thomas A. Grossman, Professional Law Corporation

The current focus of my firm, Thomas A. Grossman, Professional Law Corporation, is the operation of a mediation and arbitration service known as Desert ADR. Desert ADR has been providing high quality mediations, arbitrations, and other alternative dispute resolution (ADR) services to the Coachella Valley and Riverside County for over five years. The goal of Desert ADR is to settle or decide disputes outside of the court system. Desert ADR has handled over 400 matters over the last five years.

I devote about 20% of my time to private clients, mostly in the area of business law matters, corporate issues, real estate matters, personal injury cases, consumer rights, and other matters. I work closely with a family law lawyer, who is a member of my mediation service (Desert ADR).

My professional law corporation was established in 1994, after 15 years of solo practice and a successful partnership with a local attorney (now a retired Judge and member of Desert ADR). For the past five plus years, I have co-owned (and now solely own) Desert ADR, which is a full service alternative dispute resolution service.

1. I recently helped a client negotiate down the balances owed on several credit cards, from about $80,000 to about $25,000. Unfortunately, the client then discovered she did not have the $25,000 to pay off the debts, so we could not complete the settlements of those debts. Another settlement will be attempted when she has the money. My fees came to $1,500.

2. Several years ago, I represented a body builder for the wrongful use of his image on certain nutritional supplements. He had never signed a release for those rights, and the well-known nutrition company who manufactured and sold the products in question fought the case all the way up to trial. After the first day of trial, we settled the case for $1.3 million. We were all very happy. (I took the case on a contingency.)

3. One of my current clients was sued for supplies he purchased for his store, but could not pay for. He did not fight the lawsuit, and came to me a year and a half after the creditor secured a $3,500 judgment against him. The collection agency for the creditor then tacked on another $3,500 in interest and collected that from a lien placed in the escrow for the sale of my client's house. When the client came to me, I reviewed his papers and saw that the collection agency misrepresented to the escrow company the amount of interest owed, when collecting the extra $3,500 from the escrow funds. I wrote one letter to the collection attorney, stating that he violated the Federal Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, and demanded the return of the $3,500 in interest. I threatened a lawsuit and penalties for fraud. We received a check for $3,500 ten days later. (I also took this case on a contingency, so my fees were about $1,100. However, had I not succeeded, the client would have owed me nothing.)

4. I arbitrated a fee dispute between an attorney and her client a couple of days ago. The attorney had charged about $7,500 for her work, and the client felt that she deserved none of it, and wanted most of his fees back. During the arbitration, and once each side heard the other side's story, both sides began talking to each other. It turns out that the client didn't know and appreciate what the attorney had done for him, and the attorney didn't know that his mother had been in constant contact with the attorney, trying to tell her what to do. And the attorney admitted that her office was a little too busy at the time, and she had not made herself available to the client. The arbitration had turned into a mediation. Everyone agreed to split the difference on the fees, and walked out of the Arbitration talking and laughing. I never even had to make a ruling.

5. I reviewed a Note and Trust Deed for a client, in connection with a $60,000 loan that he was going to lend to a homeowner, to be secured by a second trust deed on the borrower's home. I ordered a title report on the property, and discovered that there was a missing link in the chain of title. I concluded that homeowner/borrower could not even prove that he was the lawful owner of the house that was to be the security for the loan. I informed my client of all of this, and he backed out of the loan. We will never know what might have happened, but he could have lost the entire $60,000 due to the defective title on the house. I charged by client $750 for three hours of work. I may have saved him $60,000.