Scott Purington Nealey

Scott Nealey is the founder of Nealey Law, a trial-focused law firm litigating complex class actions and personal injury cases nationwide.  Mr. Nealey is plaintiffs' side trial lawyer with over 19 years of experience in complex class actions, catastrophic personal injury product defects, insurance claims practices, bad faith, and appellate law.  Prior to founding Nealey Law in 2013, Mr. Nealey was a partner in the San Francisco office of Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein (LCHB), LLP. 

In the field of personal injury, Mr. Nealey has been lead or co-lead counsel in over 15 major trials in his career, personally preparing for trial, and then resolving, seven of the top ten personal injury case recoveries in the history of LCHB during his tenure.  He was the co-lead counsel in Mraz v. DaimlerChrysler, a case involving the death of a Los Angeles dockworker killed by a park-to-reverse defect in a Dodge Dakota.  A jury in Los Angeles Superior Court returned a verdict of $55.2 million, including $50 million in punitive damages, while on appeal the case was eventually resolved for $24 million.  For his work in Mraz, Mr. Nealey received the 2007 California Lawyer Attorney of the Year (CLAY) Award and was named a Finalist for San Francisco Trial Lawyer of the Year in 2008.  California Lawyer called the Mraz victory against DaimlerChrysler, “one of the year’s largest personal injury verdicts,” and noted “this was the first park-to-reverse case against Chrysler in 25 years to make it to trial.”

Mr. Nealey was also the lead trial lawyer in a subsequent trial against Chrysler that resulted in a $7.2 million verdict in St. Bernard Parish, Louisiana, and has prepared for trial, and resolved, a number of additional automobile and other product defect matters.

Recently, as the lead trial counsel, Mr. Nealey prepared for trial a major class action case against Farmers Insurance (Moeller v. Farmers, No. 99-2-07850-6 (Pierce Cty WA)). The case was resolved two weeks before trial for $48.5 million.  This was followed by a further $15 Million settlement this year against another insurer for the same improper claims practice.

In addition to trial work, Mr. Nealey has an active appellate practice and has authored over 20 appellate and amicus briefs, and has successfully argued cases in appellate courts nationwide.