PARTNER
Christopher G. Kerr
Christopher G. Kerr is a trial attorney with experience in superior courts across Southern California, as well as in the California Court of Appeal and the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. He focuses on real property litigation, including easement, encroachment, boundary, quiet title, trespass, and nuisance disputes between neighboring landowners. He also handles cases involving landlord-tenant issues, personal injury claims, and homeowners' association matters.
He began working at HSSA as a law clerk in 2006 during his second year of law school and has been a partner since 2018. Before attending law school, Mr. Kerr interned for two years with the corporate legal department at Sun Microsystems, Inc. in Menlo Park and London while completing his undergraduate degree. After his first year of law school, he returned to London for a summer internship with a boutique firm focused on corporate compliance and data protection.
Outside of his legal practice, Mr. Kerr is a car enthusiast, amateur photographer and DJ, and avid snowboarder. He previously served on the board of his former building’s homeowners’ association, including as President, where he helped guide the association through construction defect litigation and internal disputes between homeowners.
Select results:
In March 2024, Mr. Kerr was the lead trial attorney in Rodriguez v. Paz, a lawsuit filed by tenants against their landlord. The tenants’ last settlement demand before trial was $155,000, while the landlord had offered $20,000. After a 10-day trial, a downtown Los Angeles jury awarded the tenants $16,500 in total damages but found the landlord only 30% at fault. Because the verdict was less than the landlord’s earlier $20,000 settlement offer, California law allowed the landlord to recover legal costs, which wiped out the verdict and resulted in a $60,000 judgment in the landlord’s favor.
In December 2024, Mr. Kerr secured a unanimous defense verdict from a jury in Bakersfield in Jones v. Henden, a lawsuit where the plaintiff claimed a property owner was responsible for his burn injuries. The injuries occurred when the plaintiff tried to start a broken-down RV by pouring gasoline into its carburetor, which caused a fire. The jury found in favor of the defendants, and the court entered a judgment awarding them $42,000.
Mr. Kerr served as lead attorney in Weiser Law Firm PC v. Hartlieb, a case that arose from his client’s involvement in several shareholder derivative lawsuits. The plaintiff, a law firm, had previously submitted a request for attorney’s fees in a Kansas case that was reduced by 90 percent due to what the court found to be serious and widespread billing irregularities, even before it learned that the firm had also relied on hours billed by a disbarred attorney to support the request. Later, when the law firm sought to be appointed as counsel in other cases, Mr. Kerr’s client alerted those courts to what had happened in Kansas. In response, the law firm sued him for abuse of process. The federal district court found that the lawsuit was an attempt to punish protected speech and granted an anti-SLAPP motion to strike the claims. The court also awarded attorney’s fees. In December 2024, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirmed the ruling in full. A judgment in the amount of $60,000 was entered in favor of Mr. Kerr’s client.
Mr. Kerr was one of the trial attorneys in Gdowski v. Tsang, a complicated contract dispute involving drainage issues on two neighboring properties in Palos Verdes Estates, California. In February 2020, the court dismissed all of the plaintiff’s claims by granting a nonsuit following the presentation of Plaintiff’s case at trial. After a subsequent remote trial concluded in February 2021, the court awarded the Tsang family $164,150 on their cross-complaint. Mr. Kerr later defended that outcome on appeal, and the California Court of Appeal, Second District, upheld the judgment in full.
In November 2018, Mr. Kerr was one of the trial attorneys in the matter of Sager v. J-Mar Investment Co., in which the plaintiff claimed significant physical and mental health symptoms were the result of exposure to mold following water leaks at an apartment in Long Beach, California. After a three-week trial, a Pasadena jury returned a defense verdict on all claims, resulting in a judgment in favor of defendants in excess of $100,000.
Education
PEPPERDINE UNIVERSITY, SCHOOL OF LAW
Juris Doctor, 2008
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SANTA CRUZ
B.A., Film and Digital Media, 2005
Bar Admissions
• State Bar of California
• United States District Court for the Central District of California
• United States Court of Appeal for the Ninth Circuit