Patrick R. Emerson

Patrick Emerson is a special counsel in the Business Trial Practice Group in the firm's Los Angeles office.

Areas of Practice

For almost 15 years, Patrick has served as an advocate and counselor for insurers in coverage and bad faith disputes. Patrick has secured successful outcomes in federal and state courts and handled a wide variety of subject-matters and insurance lines. Insurers regularly retain Patrick for high exposure cases involving novel challenges for the insurance industry.

Patrick has represented insurers headquartered across the U.S., and in the U.K., Europe, and Japan. He has also served as U.S. counsel for Bermuda insurers, handling matters through to arbitration in London. In addition to California, Patrick is admitted in Illinois, where he attended law school, externed in the Northern District of Illinois, and practiced for over seven years.

Patrick has authored numerous articles on insurance and litigation topics and is a contributing editor to the Rutter California Practice Guide: Insurance Litigation.

Experience

• Won dismissal of a bank’s alleged multi-million-dollar insurance claim based on the failure to provide timely notice under a claims-made-and-reported policy and an insolvency exclusion
• Obtained summary judgment regarding the duty to defend based on the absence of a potentially covered “occurrence”
• Obtained judgment on the pleadings in favor of an insurer against a general contractor, based on a subcontractor bodily injury exclusion
• Defended London underwriters against a municipality’s claim involving an alleged seven-figure loss and bad faith, and negotiated settlement following summary judgment briefing
• Counseled over a dozen insurers on novel COVID-19 business interruption coverage issues under commercial property policies
• Obtained a favorable ruling for a Bermuda insurer in a London arbitration involving a multi-billion-dollar pharmaceutical product
• Counseled US and international insurers in relation to coverage for mass product liability claims, including landmark cases in the automotive, healthcare, and pharmaceutical sectors

Honors

Best Lawyers in America: Ones to Watch, Best Lawyers, 2025