Sadhana Narayan

Chief Litigator and Managing Owner, The Narayan Law Firm

Ms. Narayan is the chief litigator and managing owner of The Narayan Law Firm, one of the largest South Asian American owned law firms in the country. She is the lead counsel on the Firm's Federal, Civil Rights and Employment practice areas and focuses primarily on Litigation, Employment and Complex Litigation matters.

In 2009, Ms. Narayan was named as one of the top 5% of lawyers in Northern California by Super Lawyers magazine.

Ms. Narayan has been extremely successful in the San Francisco Bay Area community as both a lawyer and as a businesswoman. She has founded and successfully manages a seven attorney, multimillion dollar business enterprise for the last 18 years. She is also a Charter member of the Indian American Chamber of Commerce. She has represented numerous Fortune 500 Business Clients including Taco Bell, Safeway, ABM Industries and Pacific Gas and Electric Company.

Prior to founding and managing her own firm, Ms. Narayan was employed in the San Francisco Financial District offices of a 500 attorney New York based law firm. She also served as a law clerk to the General Counsel for the Honeywell Corporation in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

Ms. Narayan has handled over twenty five (25) trials, with nineteen (19) matters involving jury trials. She has tried cases to jury verdict in the Federal Court Northern District; as well as various State Courts in San Francisco, San Mateo, Marin and Santa Clara County. She has taken or defended hundreds of depositions and appeared on five occasions before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals and/or California State Court of Appeal.

Ms. Narayan has represented the Federal Government for many years in Business Litigation, Real Estate Litigation, as well as in Bankruptcy Court. She represented the State of California at trial to a defense jury verdict in an employment case. She has successfully represented the County of Alameda for the last fourteen (14) years in numerous cases both in Federal and State Court involving 42 USC §1983 Civil Rights, Employment, Business Torts, Contractual Disputes and Personal Injury. She recently represented Contra Costa County and the Contra Costa Sheriff in Federal Court in a case involving employment liability and civil rights.

Ms. Narayan's reputation and experience have led her firm to be selected as panel counsel for various Fortune 500 insurance companies including:

• Liberty Mutual Insurance Group
• Golden Eagle Insurance
• Allstate Insurance Companies
• Safeco Insurance Companies

Ms. Narayan regularly has handled complex high value cases.

• Defending the California Department of Insurance in a civil rights and employment bias case to a defense jury verdict in San Francisco.
• Representing the Federal Government in the Federal Court Northern District in one of the largest real estate litigation matters in the Bay Area: involving over twenty Cross-Defendants to a successful conclusion with no taxpayer monies paid.
• Successfully representing Contra Costa County in Federal Court on Civil Rights claims asserted by a female deputy.
• Successfully representing Alameda County Sheriff's Department in an excessive force case with Civil Rights claims involving an inmate classified as a Sexually Violent Predator.
• Representing through Jury Verdict in the Federal Court, Northern District, and in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, Civil Rights claims against the County of Alameda Department of Social Services on the constitutionality of its longstanding policies on removal of children from their parents.
• Obtaining a defense jury verdict at trial on a brain injury case involving admitted liability against the County of Alameda.
• Obtaining client favorable judgments involving employment discrimination claims against the Alameda County Medical Center.
• Representing San Mateo County Department of Social Services Supervisor on sexual harassment, whistleblower and retaliation claims.
• Representing a Safeco insured through a defense favorable verdict after a two month jury trial in Marin County on a matter involving fraud, torts, real estate and related matters.
• Representing all Defendants in Cheung v. Dailey through trial to jury verdict in San Francisco. Case significant because on Appeal, punitive damage award overturned pursuant to legal precedent Ms. Narayan cited in post trial Motions. Cited for many years as the only Comment to BAJI Section involving Punitive Damages.
• Representing the Regents of the University of California in numerous cases involving injury and damages.

• BA in Economics, The University of California at Berkeley, 1983
• JD degree from The University of San Francisco School of Law, 1987

Ms. Narayan has maintained a National Reputation as a leader in the Employment and Civil Rights fields. She has appeared as an expert in these fields on Court TV on several occasions on cases involving high profile nationally known matters.
Ms. Narayan is active in the legal, minority and local communities. She provides her services as Judge Pro Tem and Court approved arbitrator in San Francisco and Santa Clara County Superior Courts. She serves as an Early Neutral Evaluator for the Federal Court, Northern District. She serves on the Board of the San Mateo County Bar Association, Board of the South Asian Bar Association, and was one of its original twenty members. She currently provides legal counsel to the Fiji American National Association. She also serves as Member of the California Woman Lawyers, the Asian American Bar Association, the Alameda County Bar Association, the Contra Costa County Bar Association, and the American Bar Association.

Her positions have included:

• Board Member, San Mateo County Bar Association
• Chair of the Litigation Section of the Barristers of the Bar Association of San Francisco
• Officer of the Eastern Alameda County Bar Association
• Board Member of the Women Lawyers of Alameda County
• Board Member of the South Asian Bar Association