O ’Donnell is one of the leading trial lawyers in the country. A partner in

In recognition of winning numerous precedent-setting cases, Mr. O'Donnell was named one of the "100 Most Influential Lawyers in America" by the National Law Journal. Over the past decade, he has been consistently rated as one of the best trial lawyers in California and Los Angeles by various publications and his peers. Recently, he served as co-lead counsel in securing a $1.7 billion settlement from El Paso National Gas Co., the largest antitrust settlement in California history. He was lead counsel for Firestone in the landmark "fear of cancer" case in Potter v. Firestone Tire & Rubber Co., 6 Cal. 4th 965 (1993). He also served as lead trial counsel for Pfizer Inc., successfully defending 375 anxiety/emotional distress cases involving allegedly defective Shiley heart valves. In 1995, Mr. O'Donnell won the landmark case of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Inc. v. American Honda Motor Co., Inc., 900 F. Supp. 1287 (C.D. Cal. 1995), which recognized federal copyright protection of the fictional movie character James Bond. Three years later, he successfully enjoined Sony Corporation from launching its own competing James Bond movie franchise. (Danjaq, LLC v. Sony Corp., 49 U.S.P.Q. 2d 1341, aff'd, 165 F.3d 915 (9th Cir. 1998)). In 2004, Mr. O'Donnell won a jury trial for Pfizer Inc in which the plaintiffs claimed that the diabetes drug Rezulin had caused liver injury resulting in the deaths of two patients.

Mr. O'Donnell successfully defended Lockheed Martin Corporation against 3,200 toxic tort claims. Following his preliminary injunction and appellate victory in GoTo.com v. Walt Disney Co., 202 F.3d 1199 (9th Cir. 2000), Mr. O'Donnell obtained a $21.5 million trademark infringement settlement for his client GoTo.com. In a series of environmental cost recovery cases under CERCLA, he has won judgments or settlements for his clients of over $350 million. Mr. O'Donnell has developed innovative methods for budgeting litigation, streamlining discovery, and mediation of complex cases.

Mr. O'Donnell's litigation clients include ConocoPhillips, Lockheed Martin Corporation, Pfizer Inc., Reebok, Bridgestone/Firestone, General Electric Capital, National Broadcasting Company, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Inc./United Artists Corporation, DreamWorks SKG, Texaco, W.R. Grace, McCarthy Construction, Miramax Films, New Line Cinema, Republic of France, the South Coast Air Quality Management District, and the cities of Los Angeles, Long Beach, Pasadena, Anaheim, and Newport Beach. He also represents many celebrities, including Vidal Sassoon against Proctor & Gamble, Ron Isley in an appeal preserving his $6.5 million copyright infringement verdict against Michael Bolton (212 F.3d 477 (2000)) and Faye Dunaway in her lawsuit against Andrew Lloyd Webber over her wrongful termination from the Los Angeles production of "Sunset Boulevard."

A noted author of over 200 articles and five books, O'Donnell co-authored Fatal Subtraction: How Hollywood Really Does Business (Doubleday, 1992), a best selling account of his successful representation of Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist Art Buchwald against Paramount Pictures in the famous "Coming to America" case. In the wake of his triumph, Forbes Magazine hailed Mr. O'Donnell as "the new Perry Mason in Hollywood." He also co-authored the screenplay for the feature film Home Team (starring Steve Guttenberg). His most recent book is Dawn's Early Light (Rosebud 2001), a collection of poems.

Mr. O'Donnell is a Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers, the International Academy of Trial Lawyers, and American Board of Trial Advocates, an Elected Member of the American Law Institute and P.E.N., and Past President of the Economic Round Table of Los Angeles. He frequently lectures at Harvard, UCLA, USC, Loyola, and Pepperdine. He has served as an Adjunct Professor at the UCLA Independent Film and Television Producers Program and as a consultant to the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee on federal criminal law reform. He lives in Montecito, California with his wife Dawn and five children.