Wednesday, October 30, 2002
Page 3
Intellectual Property Lawyer James Potepan Moves to Ropers Majeski
By a MetNews Staff Writer
Ropers Majeski Kohn & Bentley has added James Potepan as a partner in its Los Angeles office.
Potepan, an intellectual property lawyer, came to Ropers Majeski from Cooper Kardaras & Kelleher in Pasadena on Sept. 23. He brings with him two associates, as well as clients in both Northern and Southern California.
Potepan said those clients were one of the reasons he chose to join Ropers Majeski.
“I find that my IP clients want the assurance and comfort of being represented by a firm that has a substantial presence,” he said. “I find that important because clients that have businesses operating in Southern California often find themselves involved in litigation in Northern California, or vice versa.”
Allan Anderson, managing partner of Roper Majeski’s Los Angeles office, said his firm hired Potepan as part of a decision last fall to double the size of the office in five years.
“I know of him by reputation as an excellent lawyer,” Anderson said. “[The firm] felt he would mesh well with our practice in Los Angeles and in the rest of the firm.”
Anderson said the firm is expanding in general, but particularly in Los Angeles, where it plans to have 37 partners by the end of this year and about 50 by 2006. Though the Los Angeles office will have no particular specialty, the firm is planning to expand its intellectual property, labor law and real estate groups, Anderson said, primarily through lateral hires of partners with compatible practice areas.
“It’s a good market down here,” Anderson said. “We only have one office here but three in Northern California. There are excellent business opportunities in Southern California.”
The announcement follows another hire by Roper Majeski of a Cooper Karderas partner. Roper Majeski announced last summer that it had hired Gerald Knapton, an expert in fee disputes and litigation management. Anderson said the hires are “not a package deal,” just a coincidence.
Potepan specializes in unfair competition and trademark and copyright litigation. He has worked on several high-profile copyright cases, including one that provoked a Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals decision clarifying the duty of inquiry for a defendant claiming innocent infringement when the copyright notice is in the name of someone other than the named author.
Potepan earned a bachelor’s degree with high honors from the University of California at Riverside, a master’s degree from UCLA and a law degree from Loyola Law School.
Coming with Potepan from Cooper Karderas are associates Thomas O’Leary and James Hildebrand. O’Leary, a former mayor of Covina, has experience in trademark and copyright infringement litigation. He holds an undergraduate degree from the University of La Verne, a master’s degree from San Diego State University and a law degree from the University of San Diego.
Hildebrand is a graduate of the University of California at Santa Cruz and a cum laude graduate of the Southwestern University Law School, where he served as research editor for the University Law Review from 1989 to 1990. He has experience in insurance bad faith defense and trademark and copyright litigation.
Roper Majeski has about 130 lawyers in offices in San Francisco, Redwood City, Los Angeles, New York and its San Jose headquarters. It is a full-service law firm focusing on litigation and transactional services.
Copyright 2002, Metropolitan News Company