Solana Beach, CA

John Gomez

John Gomez is the firm’s founder and lead trial attorney. John grew up in San Diego and attended Grossmont College and San Diego State before graduating from the University of San Diego. At USD, he played football and was recognized as an Academic All American. John worked as a social worker in Southeast San Diego and then attended Yale Law School, the nation’s top-ranked law school. After graduating, he first clerked for a federal judge and then worked in downtown Los Angeles at Latham and Watkins, one of the world’s largest and most prestigious law firms. There, he worked on billion dollar matters for some of the largest companies in the world. John, however, knew he wanted to try cases and serve his community. For that reason, he returned to San Diego to work as a federal prosecutor. As a member of the United States Attorney’s Southern District Office, he served his country by trying border, narcotics and corruption cases. After trying and winning twenty jury trials in a row, he decided he wanted to work for San Diegans and their families. And so he next began working as a trial lawyer for people. In his first civil jury trial he obtained a $1.6 million verdict in a zero offer case. He then opened Gomez Trial Attorneys. In his first trial with his new firm, he obtained a $106 million verdict in a second zero offer case. In the twenty years since, John has established himself as one of our nation’s leading trial lawyers. He has obtained jury verdicts in excess of one million dollars in more than 20 separate cases, and has been named San Diego’s Trial Lawyer of the Year two separate years. He also has earned 12 different Outstanding Trial Lawyer awards, more than any lawyer in San Diego history. John’s outstanding results have come in cases involving civil rights, sexual harassment and abuse, wrongful death, brain and other catastrophic injury and dangerous product cases. His peers have recognized his excellence, voting him the number one lawyer in San Diego among all fields twice and a top 10 lawyer overall every year for the past 12 years running. He is a member of the American Board of Trial Advocates and a former President of the Consumer Attorneys of San Diego. Personally, John is a family man. He is a devoted husband to Leah and the proud father of JD, Michael, Analise and Jolie. He is also a devout believer, who leads a prayer and bible group each Monday at work. Finally, John is extremely proud of his San Diego roots and Mexican American heritage. He speaks, reads and writes Spanish fluently and frequently appears on both English and Spanish news networks. John is a hands-on and present Firm leader. He believes strongly in leading from the front and leading by example. He believes that whatever gifts or blessings that God has provided him, he must share those gifts and blessings with those around him, including those in need. For that reason, John is deeply involved in a number of charitable and community organizations. John is also a member of the Rock church, an active jiu jitsu practitioner and competitor and a proud Latino.

Joshua Harris

Joshua Harris is a Partner and Director of Mass Tort Litigation at Gomez Trial Attorneys. After spending several years at one of the nation’s most prominent mass tort firms, Josh joined Gomez Trial Attorneys to expand the types of cases the firm handles thus expanding the number of injured people the firm can assist. Josh’s practice focuses on mass torts including defective products, pharmaceutical injuries, and environmental harms. Josh is a born-and-raised Florida native having attended the University of Florida and Stetson University College of Law. Throughout his collegiate career, Josh focused on honing his skills as a trial attorney. While attending Stetson Law, Josh was a member of the college’s #1 nationally ranked trial team and competed in numerous trial competitions throughout the country. After graduating, Josh worked for three years as a public defender and was lead counsel in over thirty trials, most of which were jury trials. Josh then became a civil plaintiff lawyer focusing on mass torts and drastically increasing the number of individuals he would be able to represent and assist through the hardest times of their lives. As a mass torts lawyer, Josh has participated in numerous litigations involving defective devices and harmful drugs. Having been fortunate enough to learn from some of the best lawyers in the country, he was quickly able to develop his skills to effectively represent clients and ensure they were fairly and adequately compensated for the injuries caused to them by large corporations. Josh was also a member of the national opiate litigation and assigned to work up a case against one of the major distributor defendants and participate in a bellwether trial. The work performed by the national team of trial lawyers resulted in a $21 billion national settlement against the Big 3 Distributors. Josh has experience representing both individuals as well as governmental entities such as cities, counties, and even several Attorneys General. Josh has been recognized by many organizations such as the National Trial Lawyers Top 40 Under 40 and Super Lawyers as a Florida Rising Star. In addition, Josh is active in several organizations such as American Association of Justice, Florida Justice Association, and National Trial Lawyers. These organizations champion the rights of people and fight to ensure access to the courts for all. He has also been honored to speak at national mass tort conferences and has published several works covering his practice field. Ultimately, Josh believes in advocating for his clients both in and out of the courtroom.

Dave Fox

Dave is a former federal prosecutor and seasoned plaintiffs trial lawyer that has dedicated his career to helping ordinary people get through extraordinary circumstances. Dave has obtained over $1 billion for his clients through outstanding settlements and verdicts in difficult cases involving wrongful death, catastrophic injuries, and property damage. Dave was recognized by Best Lawyers as “Lawyer of the Year” for Mass Torts and Class Actions for 2023. He has also been recognized by his San Diego peers as a Super Lawyer, Outstanding Trial Lawyer, and Distinguished Alumni of the University of San Diego School of Law. Dave’s aggressive but pragmatic approach has also led to more than 100 seven- and eight-figure settlements for his clients, including a $40 million wrongful death settlement, a $33 million wrongful death settlement and a $19.5 million personal injury and wildfire/property damage settlement. Dave has had remarkable success as a trial lawyer representing plaintiffs who have been injured. Dave received a $9.5 million dollar judgment after jury verdict on a back injury disputed liability case where the highest offer from the defense was $220,000. Dave took a zero-offer motorcycle accident case to trial against the United States, prevailed, and obtained $5 million for his clients. Dave also tried a case involving a slip and fall on water at a supermarket that aggravated his client’s shoulder arthritis, and the jury returned a verdict for $1.43 million dollars. In another case, Dave and his client rejected a small settlement offer for a broken ankle after an auto accident, prevailed at trial, and obtained $1.1 million dollars. Dave is also adept at successfully prosecuting complex mass tort fire claims and as a result was asked to try the Powerhouse Fire case against the City of Los Angeles, Department of Water and Power. The case resolved days before trial was set to start, and ultimately the victims received a payout of approximately $103 million dollars. Dave and his firm have been court appointed to numerous leadership roles in wildfire cases, including the Plaintiffs’ Executive Committees in Sacramento for the 2015 Butte Fire case against PG&E and 2022 McKinney Fire case against PacifiCorp, the Plaintiffs’ Steering/Executive Committees in San Francisco for the 2017 North Bay fire case and 2021 Dixie Fire case against PG&E, the Plaintiffs’ Executive/Steering Committees in Los Angeles for the 2017 Ventura/Thomas Fire/Montecito Mudslide case, 2018 Malibu/Woolsey Fire case, and 2025 Altadena/Eaton Fire case against Southern California Edison (SCE). Dave began his legal career by clerking for the Honorable Janis L. Sammartino, a federal district court judge in San Diego. After that, he joined a top international law firm, Cooley LLP, where he represented Fortune 500 companies in high stakes litigation and class actions. He was later honored to serve the public as a federal prosecutor in the United States Attorney’s Office, Southern District of California. There, he successfully investigated, prosecuted and tried numerous cases involving public corruption, weapons trafficking, drug trafficking, and bank robbery. Dave successfully tried over 12 cases to verdict, including a high profile 5-week trial against corrupt United States Border Patrol agents. The jury found the “Villareal Brothers” guilty of taking bribes, alien smuggling, and money laundering. They were later sentenced to thirty years in prison. Dave is highly involved in the San Diego legal community. He has served on the federal Magistrate Judicial Selection Committee and as a Lawyer Representative to the Ninth Circuit. He has served on the Board of Directors of the San Diego County Bar Association and the Association of Business Trial Lawyers (“ABTL”). He also taught as an Adjunct Professor of Trial Practice at the University of San Diego School of Law, and has been on the faculty for the National Institute of Trial Advocates (“NITA”). Dave has also served as the Chair of Advisory Board for Mothers Against Drunk Driving “MADD” for nearly a decade.

Steven A. Elia established Elia Law Firm in 2001. Since then, he has focused on plaintiff’s personal injury, civil litigation and business transactional matters. Mr. Elia has handled over 1,000 personal injury cases, obtaining excellent results. He has extensive litigation experience having appeared at more than 1,000 civil hearings including jury and bench trials, over 500 depositions, and hundreds of mediations. Some of his cases have made national and local headlines. He has prosecuted and defended many substantial civil matters in both state and federal courts. In some instances, his cases have included litigating various complex cases in simultaneous state and federal proceedings.

Brian Mason

Brian Mason grew up in a small town in Oregon where he spent most of his free time playing basketball and working summer jobs on farms and in a paper mill. Eventually Brian went on to play college basketball in Portland, Oregon. After his basketball career ended, Brian received a Bachelor of Science in Sociology from the University of Oregon in Eugene, Oregon. Brian then attended law school at Thomas Jefferson School of Law in San Diego, California where he received the Witkin Award for receiving the top grade in Criminal Law, Civil Procedure, Trial Practice, California Evidence, and Legal Writing. During Brian’s last year of law school in 2007, he received a Pro-Bono Honors Award for volunteering more than 300 hours of legal service to the San Diego County Public Defender’s Multiple Conflicts Office to help defend indigent criminal defendants in multiple first-degree homicide cases. Since law school, Brian has appeared in California State and Federal Courts thousands of times, including as the solo counsel on dozens of jury trials. Brian’s first trial was only 6 months out of law school and was a bench trial in Federal Bankruptcy Court where Brian successfully took on Wells Fargo Bank and was able to remove a $150,000 lien from his client’s home. After that, Brian was lead counsel in dozens of jury trials in criminal cases that included multiple life-in-prison felony cases, including the “Coronado Bridge Road Rage Case” trial in which ABC, NBC, and CBS all had cameras in the courtroom throughout the trial to witness Brian obtain an acquittal for his client in this high-profile case in which his client was arrested for attempted murder on the Coronado Bridge. In 2011, Brian worked as an expert legal correspondent on radio programs on KCBQ 1170 AM and KPRZ 1210 AM where he was interviewed about multiple high-profile cases at the time, including the Casey Anthony Murder Trial and the Wal-Mart Wage Discrimination Class Action lawsuit. In 2015, Brian accepted a position as in-house counsel with Mercury Insurance Company. In that position, Brian was the solo defense counsel on dozens of civil jury trials that resulted in defense verdicts for Brian’s clients. Before leaving to join Gomez Trial Attorneys, Brian was a lead attorney on the “trial team” at Mercury Insurance Company and would be called in at the time of trial to try cases of high value throughout the state of California on behalf of Mercury Insurance. As a result of his vast jury trial experience in civil personal injury cases on behalf of both Defendants and injured Plaintiffs, Brian was voted in as a member of the distinguished American Board of Trial Advocates (“ABOTA”). Less than 1% of all lawyers in the United States are allowed membership by invitation and only after the lawyer has completed a certain number of civil jury trials. Brian was inducted into this prestigious group in 2020 after having been the lead and solo trial attorney successfully trying more than 30 civil and criminal trials by jury. In addition to being a member of ABOTA, Brian was voted as a Super Lawyer Rising Star in 2018, 2019 and 2020. He was also voted into the prestigious TOP 100 Personal Injury Lawyers in America Club and the National Top 100 Trial Lawyers. In 2017, Brian also accepted a part-time position as an adjunct professor of law teaching Legal Writing II at Thomas Jefferson School of Law. Brian lives in the Serra Mesa neighborhood of San Diego with his wife and three children. He spends his free time having fun with his wife and kids, camping, watching his kids play sports, and playing pick-up basketball with his friends.

Chandler Roth

Chandler Roth is a trial attorney with Gomez Trial Attorneys. Chandler focuses her practice on employment litigation and bringing lawsuits to help employees who have been wronged by their employers and suffered emotional or financial losses as a result of the same. Chandler is a first-generation attorney who takes pride in working hard and fighting for her clients. Chandler has been recognized as a Top 40 Under 40 Civil Plaintiff Lawyer by the National Trial Lawyers and as a Super Lawyers Rising Star. A dedicated advocate, Chandler has been commended for her polished and poised oral argument skills by prominent judges of the San Diego Superior Court. Chandler graduated magna cum laude from the University of Colorado Boulder where she obtained a bachelor’s degree in political science with a minor in business innovation. Eager for legal experience, she worked as a law clerk in a small criminal defense practice between classes. After graduation, Chandler packed her car and moved to San Diego where she immediately began law school at the University of San Diego School of Law. While attending the University of San Diego School of Law, Chandler was a competing member of the National Mock Trial team and an Associate Writer and Editor of the San Diego Law Review. Chandler served on the executive board of the University of San Diego Business Law Society and maintained active roles in the Women’s Law Caucus and Middle Eastern Law Students Association. Chandler simultaneously worked as a law clerk at a local trial firm where she participated in a bench trial while certified under the State Bar of California’s Practical Training of Law Students program. Chandler was awarded the David S. Casey Trial Advocacy Scholarship for her achievements on the Mock Trial team and distinction in trial advocacy coursework. Prior to joining Gomez Trial Attorneys, Chandler worked at a prominent civil defense firm handling complex litigation arising from commercial motor vehicle accidents and premises liability. Chandler learned first-hand how to negotiate with large corporations and insurance companies. This experience provided Chandler with a unique competitive edge in dealing with defense counsel and insurance adjusters as a plaintiff’s attorney. In her role at Gomez Trial Attorneys, Chandler is honored to serve as a voice for her clients.

Dean Goetz

Dean Goetz is a personal injury attorney at The Goetz Law Firm, known for successfully handling complex cases including the first Depuy hip trial in the USA, securing an $8.3 million jury verdict. He represents clients in car, bicycle, motorcycle, pedestrian, and truck accident cases, as well as product liability and wrongful death claims. He was nominated for California Consumer Attorney of the Year in 2017.