OUR NEUTRALS

In September of 2011, David Velasquez retired after 23 years of service to work as a mediator, arbitrator and private judge. During his tenure on the bench he served in almost every assignment of the court including the Appellate Department. However, his primary assignments were on the civil and complex civil panels. One of his most challenging and fulfilling assignments was as a judge on the Court's Complex Civil Panel, where he served for seven years starting in May, 2004. For four years of that term he served as the Supervising Judge. While sitting on the Court's Complex Civil Panel, he had the task of managing an average case load of 250 complex actions including dozens of complex business disputes, and over 100 class actions and construction defect actions alike. His case load included several mass tort actions involving national and international product liability/pharmaceutical claims, as well as a train crash - each such case numbering 125 to 250 plaintiffs. Judge Velasquez loves to mediate and is proud that he personally participated in helping the parties settle scores of these actions including several "inventory" settlements as a way of managing the mass torts. Lawyers assigned to his court in these cases would soon become accustomed to the judge's "Sweeps Weeks" where he cleared his regular calendar to accommodate back-to-back settlement conferences for 1 to 2 weeks at a time on a single case. One attorney said, “It’s unfortunate that he is leaving the bench, but I will definitely use him as a mediator or arbitrator. He’s fair, a genuinely nice guy and you can tell how much he cares.” Many others have concurred labeling him as “nice”, “a true gentlemen” and “fair to all parties”.

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