Legal Teaching Experience, Special Expertise, and Training

Professional career:

I retired from my 47-year personal injury trial practice on June 30, 2015. I remain an active member of the State Bar of California (#43347), offering my services as an independent arbitrator, mediator, and discovery referee under my firm name, “Michael S. Fields, Esq., Arbitrator and Mediator Services.” I continue to write and edit legal publications.

My legal career commenced with state and federal licensing on January 9, 1969. I had the good fortune of being hired by a small law firm to assume the practice of a firm partner, Hon. Ross M. Bigelow, who became a municipal court judge the week of my swearing-in. During my first six months of practice, I successfully led two jury trials to verdict.

In the summer of 1975, I opened my law office in downtown Los Angeles as a sole practitioner. In August 1981, my law firm was incorporated as “Michael S. Fields, Incorporated.” The corporation was deactivated upon my retirement in 2015.

For most of my legal career, I was a personal injury trial attorney representing plaintiffs in state and federal court. I estimate I had over 500 jury, court, and arbitration proceedings to a conclusion. Additionally, I acted as an arbitrator or mediator over 100 times.

Legal teaching experience, unique expertise, and training [partial list]:

From 1971 to 1978, adjunct professor of tort law at Western State College of Law;
For over 30 years, a frequent lecturer, organizer, or moderator of over 100 educational programs for attorneys and/or their support staff on:
- Arbitration, mediation, tort lien claims, bar ethics, substantive tort law, civil procedures, evidence, and various other topics;
- Presentations were before the Los Angeles County Bar Association, Consumer Attorneys of California, State Bar of California, Consumer Attorneys Association of Los Angeles, Rutter Group, American Bar Association, Continuing Education of the Bar, Association of Business Trial Lawyers of Los Angeles; Long Beach Bar Association, Southeast Bar Association, and others.
Expertise in contractual arbitration and mediation law, with considerable familiarity and knowledge of the California Arbitration Act, Federal Arbitration Act, California’s “Ethics Standards for Neutral Arbitrators in Contractual Arbitration,” mediation Evidence Codes 1118-1129, and discovery referee codes, rules, and procedure;
Arbitrator or mediator for over 160 cases;
American Arbitration Association Consumer Arbitrator Panel;
Court-appointed settlement officer over 100 times;
Court-appointed Resolve Law LA MSC settlement officer nearly 100 times;
UCLA certified trained mediator, Westwood campus (2001);
Harvard Negotiation Institute, negotiation training certificate, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts (2009);
Pepperdine University School of Law, Straus Institute for Dispute Resolution; “Arbitrating Sports Disputes” seminar (2009);
International Commercial Arbitration Academy (2019); and
Pepperdine University School of Law, Straus Institute for Dispute Resolution, “Advanced Mediation Skills” (June 2019);
American Arbitration Association arbitration training;
Expertise in tort lien claim law; and
Frequent lecturer and writer on tort lien claim law and negotiations.

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