Best Lawyers® | Wisner Baum

Best Lawyers Honorees from Wisner Baum

Michael L. Baum | Best Lawyers

Best Lawyer Since: 2016
Recognized for: Consumer Protection Law, Personal Injury Litigation, and Product Liability Litigation

Michael is the senior managing shareholder of Wisner Baum. He has successfully led the firm through thousands of wrongful death and personal injury cases stemming from major pharmaceutical product liability and commercial transportation mass disasters.

Michael directs all of the firm’s mass tort litigation involving defective pharmaceuticals, medical devices, and other consumer products, all of which require extensive experience litigating product liability issues. He has and in depth understanding of scientific issues, biomedical research, clinical trials, statistics, the pharmaceutical industry, and marketing. He also oversees the firm’s class actions and whistleblower cases.

R. Brent Wisner | Best Lawyers

Best Lawyer Since: 2021
Recognized for: Product Liability Litigation and Product Liability Litigation

Brent is a senior shareholder and vice president at Wisner Baum. As one of the firm’s lead trial attorneys, Brent manages a highly-trained team of attorneys on all of the firm’s cases involving consumer fraud, mass tort litigation and pharmaceutical product liability.

His success on the first three Monsanto Roundup trials garnered national recognition for obtaining verdicts totaling $2.4 billion.

Brent was co-lead trial counsel in Pilliod et al. v. Monsanto Co. which resulted in a landmark jury verdict of $2.055 billion in 2019, the ninth-largest personal injury jury verdict in U.S. history at the time. He is the youngest lawyer in the United States to win a multi-billion dollar jury verdict.

In the wake of the historic courtroom victory in Pilliod, Brent spent hundreds of hours in settlement negotiations, seeking to achieve the best possible result for his clients. He helped negotiate one of the largest mass tort settlements in history: $10.9 billion to resolve tens of thousands of pending Roundup cases against Monsanto (now Bayer).

Brent received numerous awards and accolades for his role in the Monsanto Roundup litigation and is now widely recognized as one of the nation’s top trial attorneys. After resolving the firm’s Roundup cases, Brent turned his attention to the Zantac cancer litigation. He represents thousands of clients in cases alleging the popular heartburn medication causes several forms of cancer.

Bijan Esfandiari | Best Lawyers

Best Lawyer Since: 2022
Recognized for: Personal Injury Litigation

Bijan Esfandiari is a shareholder at Wisner Baum who focuses his practice on pharmaceutical product liability litigation. Bijan has successfully represented numerous clients in state and federal courts across the U.S. at both the trial and appellate level in personal injury and wrongful death cases.

Throughout his career, Bijan has worked on cases that shaped and developed the law to benefit consumers harmed by dangerous pharmaceutical drugs and medical devices. In one such case, the Court agreed with Bijan’s arguments and, in an issue of first impression, held that drug manufacturers owe an affirmative duty to warn of the risks associated with children’s off-label use. Bijan oversees the firm’s Gardasil HPV vaccine litigation against Merck.

Timothy A. Loranger | Best Lawyers

Best Lawyer Since: 2017
Recognized for: Aviation Law, Personal Injury Litigation, and Product Liability Litigation

Tim is a pilot and shareholder at Baum Wisner Baum, where he concentrates his practice on product liability and aviation and commercial ground transportation accidents which result in personal injury or death. Best Lawyers selected Tim as the 2020 “Lawyer of the Year” for Personal Injury Litigation in Los Angeles.

The Best Lawyers “Lawyer of the Year” award is presented to one lawyer who receives the highest overall peer feedback in one legal practice area in one metropolitan region. This distinction exemplifies an exceptional level of trust and respect that an attorney has earned from his or her peers.

A veteran of the United States Marine Corps, Tim served in Operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm. He represents service members harmed in the 2017 AAV explosion at Camp Pendleton Marine Base in San Diego County, California. Tim is proud to represent many men and women in the military in their personal injury and wrongful death lawsuits against aircraft product manufacturers.

Clay Robbins III | Best Lawyers

Best Lawyer Since: 2021
Recognized for: Aviation Law, Personal Injury Litigation, and Product Liability Litigation

Clay Robbins III is an attorney and shareholder at Wisner Baumn. He focuses his practice on transportation accident litigation and mass disasters.

Over the last 35 years, Clay’s exemplary track record of success in commercial transportation accident cases has earned the respect of both his clients and his peers.

Clay has handled a multitude of complex cases throughout his career involving major commercial transportation accidents, including airlines, general aviation, trucking and boating accidents. He successfully represented the plaintiffs in an aviation insurance bad faith action that resulted in over $9 million in compensatory and punitive damages for his clients.

In recognition of his client advocacy, Clay has earned Martindale Hubbell’s coveted peer review rating of A.V. Preeminent (the highest possible rating for preeminent legal ability and ethics). The Los Angeles County Superior Court has also appointed Clay as a Judge Pro Tem.

Ronald L. M. Goldman | Best Lawyers

Best Lawyer Since: 2013
Recognized for: Aviation Law, Personal Injury Litigation, and Product Liability Litigation

Ron is a pilot and veteran trial lawyer, board certified by the National Board of Trial Advocacy as a Civil Trial Attorney and Civil Pretrial Practice Advocate. He is a senior shareholder and the senior trial attorney for Wisner Baum, where he focuses his practice on commercial transportation liability and drug product liability.

With more than 50 years of experience practicing law, Ron has litigated hundreds of commercial transportation product liability cases. Ron was the lead negotiator in a settlement stemming from the Jan. 8, 2003 Air Midwest Flight 5481 crash in Charlotte, NC. The settlement required the airline and maintenance company to deliver an unprecedented official public apology to the families for the crash. Ron also taught Aviation Accident Law for 21 years as an adjunct law professor at Pepperdine School of Law.

Monique Alarcon | Best Lawyers – Ones to Watch

Ones to Watch Since: 2023
Recognized for: Personal Injury Litigation and Product Liability Litigation

Monique Alarcon is a Wisner Baum attorney that focuses her practice on medical device cases, pharmaceutical drug liability, and consumer fraud litigation. In addition to her work at Wisner Baum, Monique is also an adjunct Professor of Law for Loyola Law School’s Hispanic National Bar Association (HNBA) Moot Court Team.

In a recent case, Monique successfully sued the Burbank Police Department (California) for police misconduct, civil rights violations, assault, battery, unlawful seizure, excessive force, and negligence. She also obtained a settlement from the City of Irvine when the city’s former mayor violated a citizen’s first amendment rights by blocking the citizen from posting on her personal Facebook page, which she was using as a public forum concerning official mayoral business.

Pedram Esfandiary | Best Lawyers – Ones to Watch

Ones to Watch Since: 2021
Recognized for: Personal Injury Litigation and Product Liability Litigation

Pedram Esfandiary is a Wisner Baum attorney who concentrates his practice on mass tort litigation, class actions, consumer fraud, and police misconduct cases.

He was an integral part of the trials teams in the first three Monsanto Roundup trials, which culminated in jury verdicts worth more than $2.4 billion combined. In recognition of his outstanding legal work in the Monsanto litigation, Pedram was selected to Law360’s Rising Stars Top 40 Under 40 list for 2019, which recognizes attorneys whose legal accomplishments transcend their age, and Southern California’s Super Lawyers® – Rising Stars, 2019.

Pedram was among the first lawyers in the country to pursue toxic baby food lawsuits against several leading manufacturers. He represents families throughout the nation who allege baby food manufacturers failed to warn consumers of the dangerously high levels of toxic heavy metals in their products and that these toxic metals, including arsenic, cadmium, lead, and mercury, caused autism and/or ADHD in their children.

Adam M. Foster | Best Lawyers – Ones to Watch

Ones to Watch Since: 2021
Recognized for: Mass Tort Litigation / Class Actions, Personal Injury Litigation, and Product Liability Litigation

Adam M. Foster is a Wisner Baum attorney who focuses his practice on class actions and mass tort litigation. He works on a variety of cases at the firm with a major focus on the firm’s Zantac litigation.

Over the last few years, Adam has earned recognition for his exemplary legal work from Super Lawyers®, the National Trial Lawyers, and Best Lawyers®.

Helen E. Tokar | Best Lawyers – Ones to Watch

Ones to Watch Since: 2021
Recognized for: Mass Tort Litigation / Class Actions, Personal Injury Litigation, and Product Liability Litigation

Helen E. Tokar is a Wisner Baum attorney that focuses her practice on the firm’s Zantac cancer litigation.

Before joining Wisner Baum, Helen gained considerable experience handling cases across a wide variety of practice areas. During this time, she was responsible for a significant amount of personal injury cases handling everything from litigating, writing demands, conducting discovery and depositions, preparing clients for deposition and trial, handling mediations and settlement discussions, negotiating with insurance companies, and supervising case managers. Throughout her career, Helen has made many court appearances, including successfully serving as second chair in a jury trial for a personal injury case.