John D. Moore

Phone: 415-982-4000
Fax: 415-421-0912

220 Montgomery St #1100
San Francisco, California 94111

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John D. Moore is Of Counsel to the firm.

John is Board Certified in Civil Trial Law by the National Board of Trial Advocacy which is recognized by the California State Bar. He has lived in Oakland most of his life and attended Cal. John works with the firm on legal malpractice cases where the breadth of his knowledge of the law comes in handy. In 42 years of law practice John has practiced nearly every kind of law and handled nearly every kind of dispute that can be practiced. A sampling of this diversity of practice may be found here. John began his career working for Carlos Bea, then a top trial lawyer, and now a Senior Judge of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. While still in law school, John taught a law school course in writing and research and taught a Street Law class at the former Star of the Sea Academy in San Francisco. While in law school at age 24, he won his first case as a certified law student on a motion for summary judgment on a constitutional issue. After passing the Bar in 1980, John taught trial advocacy to attorneys in the Hastings College of Advocacy from 1988 until the program ended in 2000. In 1987 John became the youngest Judge pro Tem of the San Francisco Superior Court. John has served as temporary judge, settlement judge, and arbitrator in the San Francisco, Marin, and Alameda County Superior Courts. John is a SuperLawyer and has been AV-rated by Martindale-Hubbell since 1987.

He is admitted to practice before the United States Supreme Court, the Third and Ninth Circuit Courts of Appeal, and all of the US District Courts in California. For 20 years he was General legal counsel to Pet Food Express as the retail chain grew from 10 to 65 stores. In this capacity John negotiated 50 shopping center leases, handled all legal aspects of its HR needs including workplace investigations, steered land use political campaigns, and did all the litigation work including a $3.6 million federal court jury verdict. John has also been general counsel to public agencies giving him insight into how local politics works. Besides comprehensive knowledge of civil procedure and evidence, John’s only real specialty has been to represent independent recycling businesses and associations (but not franchised garbage companies) in California so that he enjoys a national reputation as a Zero Waste advocate and hosts a monthly zoomcast on that subject. An autobiography of John’s legal career in the recycling industry may be found here. A frequent speaker at recycling conferences, John served for 12 years on the Board of the Northern California Recycling Association. For many years John gave annual lectures about recycling and land use to graduate urban planning students at Cal, and how to negotiate at Holy Names University in Oakland. John currently serves on the Brain Trust for the Bay Area Legal Incubator in Oakland where he mentors younger attorneys. He is a proud member of the Alameda County Bar Association which awarded him a Distinguished Service Award in 2023.