Ernest J. Galvan

Ernest Galvan is a partner at Rosen Bien Galvan & Grunfeld LLP.  He assists clients in difficult and complex matters involving actual or potential litigation.  Mr. Galvan has worked with clients to resolve a wide range of problems, including business formation and dissolution, commercial disputes, employment law matters, disability access compliance, and attorney fee disputes.

Mr. Galvan’s practice includes both trial and appellate matters.  He has successfully briefed and argued cases in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals and the Supreme Court of California.

Mr. Galvan is a graduate of the University of California at Berkeley, and of Yale Law School.  He served as a law clerk to Judge Dean D. Pregerson of the United States District Court for the Central District of California.

Mr. Galvan has spoken on constitutional law and policy issues at hearings, seminars and conferences presented by the California State Assembly, the American Constitution Society, George Washington University Law School, Berkeley School of Law, Georgetown Law Center, and Yale Law School.

REPRESENTATIVE CASES

• U.S. WeChat Users Alliance v. Trump:  RBGG represented a non-profit organization and several individuals and businesses in the first successful challenge to President Trump’s Executive Order 13,943 (August 6, 2020) and its implementing regulations, which would have effectively banned the WeChat social media application and cut off at least 19 million daily users in the United States from their personal, professional, and religious communities.  RBGG (with co-counsel) filed the Complaint on August 21, 2020, just over two weeks after Executive Order 13,943 was issued, alleging that the intended ban unlawfully regulated constitutionally protected speech, expression, and association, and that such a ban would have particularly dire effects on millions of Chinese-speaking American users who depend on WeChat to communicate with their contacts both at home and in China.  One week later, RBGG filed a motion for preliminary injunction that served as a model for subsequent challenges to both the WeChat ban and a similar ban on the TikTok social media app.  The motion raised pathbreaking legal theories under the First Amendment and the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), offered expert testimony that the WeChat ban would do little to advance the government’s asserted national security interests, and included extensive evidence of WeChat’s critical role in connecting Chinese-speaking communities at home and abroad.  On September 19, 2020—the day before the WeChat ban was scheduled to take effect and one day after the Secretary of Commerce publicly vowed to shut down WeChat in the United States—the court granted our motion on First Amendment grounds, thereby ensuring the uninterrupted functioning of WeChat in the United States.  See U.S. WeChat Users Alliance v. Trump, 488 F. Supp. 3d 912 (N.D. Cal. 2020).  RBGG then marshalled additional testimony from experts in cyber-security and internet communications technology to fight off the government’s multiple attempts to obtain an emergency stay of the preliminary injunction in both the district court and the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.  President Biden rescinded EO 13,943 shortly after taking office, putting an end to the Trump Administration’s attempt to shut down entirely a public forum used by millions of Americans.
• Hernandez Gomez v. The GEO Group, Inc.: In July 2022, RBGG, along with co-counsel, sued GEO Group, Inc., a private prison corporation, in the federal district court for the Eastern District of California for unlawfully forcing detained immigrants to work for $1 a day or less.  GEO’s business model and profitability rely on this unlawful pay scheme, whereby the people it civilly detains earn far less than California’s $15 hourly minimum wage and are forced to perform basic janitorial, sanitation, and other services or be punished, placed in segregation, and deprived of basic necessities like adequate food, water, hygiene supplies, exercise time, and contact with loved ones.  The lawsuit seeks to end GEO’s unlawful business practices, which rely on the exploitation and forced labor of the immigrants in its custody.
• Sterling Park v. City of Palo Alto: The California Supreme Court issued a landmark decision cementing our land developer client’s rights to proper notice and an opportunity to be heard when local governments impose special requirements on housing developments. See Sterling Park, L.P v. City of Palo Alto, 57 Cal. 4th 1193 (2013). We later represented the same client in a writ petition to the Court of Appeal arising out of the trial court’s subsequent denial of summary judgment on a statute of limitations issue. The case then settled for a significant sum.
• Retired Employees Association of Orange County v. Orange County: Mr. Galvan argued this case, in which the court ruled in his client’s favor by holding that government employers must abide by their contracts for retirement benefits. See Retired Employees Assoc. of Orange County v. Orange County, 52 Cal. 4th 1171 (2011).
• Babu v. County of Alameda, N.D. Cal No. 5:18-cv-07677-NC: RBGG represents eight prisoners in a class action case filed in December 2018 against Alameda County on behalf of all prisoners, including all prisoners with psychiatric disabilities, challenging the unconstitutional use of isolation, denial of constitutionally adequate mental health treatment, and unlawful segregation of prisoners with mental illness into units without access to programming and other basic services at the County’s Santa Rita and Glenn Dyer Jails. Since the filing of the lawsuit the County closed the Glenn Dyer Jail, located in downtown Oakland, in June of 2019 and the case continues regarding conditions at the Santa Rita Jail located in Dublin.  In January 2019, the Court certified a class of all prisoners who are, or will be, incarcerated at the Santa Rita Jail as well as a subclass of all prisoners with psychiatric disabilities who are, or will be incarcerated at the Jail.  On February 7, 2022, the Court approved a Consent Decree to address problems at the Jail.  Over the next six years RBGG, as Class Counsel will work with the Defendants, the Joint Experts, and the Department of Justice to reform Alameda County Jail in areas covered by the Consent Decree.  RBGG will do this through consulting with class members; developing and implementing policies, procedures, and trainings; monitoring the Jail with the Joint Experts; and if necessary, enforcing the Consent Decree before the Court.
• Rena Wyman v. High Times Productions, Inc. and California Exposition and State Fair:  RBGG filed this federal lawsuit in the Eastern District of California in September 2018 (Case No. 18-cv-02621-TLN-EFB) on behalf of a wheelchair user who has experienced accessibility barriers at High Times’s Cannabis Cup festivals.  We seek damages and injunctive relief under the ADA, Rehabilitation Act, and California disability access laws.  
• Fabio Petrolino v. City and County of San Francisco:  RBGG represented the children, mother, and siblings of Alberto Petrolino, who was arrested after threatening suicide at the Golden Gate Bridge and accepted into custody at the County’s jail rather than being diverted to a psychiatric hospital, where, despite his family’s warnings, he was placed in regular housing with no suicide precautions and denied access to mental health treatment. Three days later, Alberto committed suicide by hanging himself in a shower stall. The family obtained a substantial settlement in the case. (U.S. District Court, Northern District of California, Case No. 16-cv-02946-RS-JCS.)
• Barcenas v. Cabillo.  Successful settlement on behalf of our client in a civil rights suit brought against San Francisco Police Department relating to the unlawful detention and unwarranted shooting of our client by an SFPD officer.  2018-2020.
• Blanks v. AMC Entertainment, Inc.:  RBGG represents the Lighthouse for the Blind and Visually Impaired, the California Council of the Blind, and five blind individuals in a class action challenging AMC’s failure to provide reliable and effective access to audio description services at its theaters nationwide.  Audio description is a verbal description of key visual aspects of a film during pauses in dialogue provided through an audio track synchronized with playback of the movie.  The parties reached a comprehensive settlement agreement in April 2017.
• Sabata v. Nebraska Department of Correctional Services:  RBGG and our co-counsel the ACLU of Nebraska, the ACLU National Prison Project, Nebraska Appleseed, the National Association of the Deaf, and DLA Piper filed a class action lawsuit on August 15, 2017 against the Nebraska Department of Correctional Services and Nebraska Board of Parole, challenging the conditions of confinement in Nebraska’s severely overcrowded and understaffed prison system, including constitutionally inadequate medical, dental and mental health care, the overuse of isolation, and the failure to provide reasonable accommodations to prisoners with disabilities.  Nebraska’s prison system is one of the most overcrowded in the US, operating at about 160% of its design capacity, with many prisons at even more dangerously high levels of overcrowding (with nearly twice as many people as they were designed to house).  In June 2020 the Court denied class certification and the parties agreed to voluntarily dismiss the case without prejudice in November 2020.  The voluntary dismissal came after NDCS made progress addressing some of the lawsuit’s concerns including by closing its solitary confinement unit at the Nebraska State Penitentiary, which expert testimony described as among the worst in the nation.  NDCS also significantly reduced the number of people in solitary confinement overall, made significant changes to policies to improve compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act, improved access to American Sign Language interpreters, adopted new policies related to mental health levels of care, and made significant improvements to its dental care policies.  (U.S. District Court, District of Nebraska, Case No. 4:17-cv-03107-RFR-MDN.)
• Valdivia v. Davis: RBGG secured a permanent injunction against the State based on a federal court’s finding that delays in its parole revocation process violated due process protections. See Valdivia v. Davis, 206 F. Supp. 2d 1068 (2002). Mr. Galvan convinced the Ninth Circuit to affirm a subsequent district court order holding that federal due process rights concerning admission of hearsay evidence apply to state administrative procedures. See Valdivia v. Schwarzenegger, 548 F. Supp. 2d 852 (E.D. Cal. 2008), aff’d 599 F.3d 984 (9th Cir. 2010), denied, 131 S. Ct. 1626 (2011).
• Prison Legal News v. Schwarzenegger: RBGG established its publisher client’s First Amendment right to send books and magazines into state institutions. We also secured a substantial fee award for our work, which we successfully defended on appeal. See Prison Legal News v. Schwarzenegger, 561 F. Supp. 2d 1096 (N.D. Cal. 2008), and 608 F.3d 446 (9th Cir. 2010).
• Prison Legal News v. Sacramento County: The firm secured its publisher client’s First Amendment rights to reach readers in county jails.
• Prison Legal News v. Ventura County:  We established our publisher client’s First Amendment rights to reach its readers by successfully challenging an unlawful jail policy limiting incoming mail to postcards.
• Fry v. City of Los Angeles: Since 2012, the firm has represented the Los Angeles Retired Firefighters and Police Association in a writ proceeding to restore adjustable retirement health benefits that the City of Los Angeles froze by ordinance in 2011. After prevailing in the trial court, partner Ernest Galvan and associate Jenny Yelin briefed and argued the case in the Court of Appeals. In 2016, the Court of Appeals ruled that the City Council should revisit adjustments to the health benefit annually, and remanded the matter to the superior court for further proceedings. Fry v. City of Los Angeles, 245 Cal. App. 4th 539 (2016) (addressing retirement health subsidies for firefighters and police).
• In re E.J.: Mr. Galvan briefed and argued this challenge to a ballot initiative under California constitutional law. See In re E.J., 47 Cal. 4th 1258 (2010).
• Gober v. Ralphs Grocery Company: RBGG secured a unanimous affirmance of our clients’ entitlement to a substantial award for workplace harassment, including a punitive damages award. See Gober v. Ralphs Grocery Co., 137 Cal. App. 4th 204 (2006).
• Armstrong v. Newsom: RBGG proved in federal court that California’s prison and parole systems violate the Americans with Disabilities Act and the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 by discriminating against prisoners and parolees with mobility, sight, hearing, learning, mental and kidney disabilities. We secured systemwide injunctive relief to end the discrimination, which was upheld on appeal.  See Armstrong v. Wilson, 942 F. Supp. 1252 (N.D. Cal. 1996), aff’d 124 F.3d 1019 (9th Cir. 1997). We also established that the State is responsible for taking steps to ensure the rights of prisoners and parolees with disabilities are accommodated when it chooses to house them in third-party county jail facilities. See Armstrong v. Brown, 857 F. Supp. 2d 919 (N.D. Cal. 2012), aff’d 732 F.3d 955 (9th Cir. 2013), cert denied, 134 S. Ct. 2725 (2014); and 622 F.3d 1058 (9th Cir. 2010).   The Armstrong litigation has resulted in a series of ground-breaking precedents, including rulings that the ADA does not permit state government agencies to avoid compliance by delegating responsibilities to local governments, and that prisoners cannot be held in solitary confinement solely on account of disability. We are currently working to stop staff misconduct targeting people with disabilities at CDCR.  On September 8, 2020 and March 11, 2021 respectively, Judge Claudia Wilken granted in part our February 2020 and June 2020 motions to stop staff misconduct at six prisons in CDCR.  The Court found that the systemic abuses against incarcerated people with disabilities at—R.J. Donovan Correctional Facility (San Diego, CA)), CSP – Los Angeles County (Lancaster, CA), CSP -Corcoran (Corcoran, CA), Kern Valley State Prison (Delano, CA), Substance Abuse Treatment Facility (Corcoran, CA), and California Institution for Women (Corona, CA) —violate the ADA and prior court orders.  As a remedy, the Court required Defendants to develop plans to install security cameras and use body worn-cameras (BWCs) throughout the six prisons, reform the staff investigation and disciplinary process, and increase supervisory staffing on all yards at the six prisons.  Currently, BWCs and fixed security cameras are in use at all six prisons.  The Court also appointed an expert to oversee implementation of the mandated reforms.  Armstrong v. Newsom, 484 F.Supp.3d 808 (N.D. Cal. 2020); Armstrong v. Newsom, 2021 WL 933106 (N.D. Cal. 2021).  On February 2, 2023, the Ninth Circuit affirmed the September 8, 2020 RJD Order in full and the majority of the March 11, 2021 Five Prisons Order (except provisions regarding increased supervisory staffing and pepper-spray policies, which were vacated.)  Armstrong v. Newsom, 58 F.4th 1283 (9th Cir. 2023).  Relatedly, on July 30, 2020, the Court ordered that CDCR transfer  two witnesses from the prison where they had faced assault, threats and other retaliation for their participation in the litigation.  Armstrong v. Newsom, 475 F. Supp. 3d 1038 (N.D. Cal. 2020). 
• Coleman v. Brown/Plata v. Brown: In a landmark decision, the United States Supreme Court ruled that overcrowding in California’s prisons resulted in cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the Eighth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The Court affirmed a January 2010 order issued by a three-judge federal court after an extensive trial directing California officials to reduce the State’s severe prison overcrowding down to 137.5% of design capacity. The order was issued after the judges found that overcrowding is the primary cause of ongoing unconstitutional conditions in California’s prisons, such as the system’s inability to provide minimally adequate medical and mental health care for prisoners.  See Brown v. Plata, 131 S. Ct. 1910 (2011).
• Hernandez v. County of Monterey: We sued the County of Monterey and its private medical provider, California Forensic Medical Group, challenging dangerous and unconstitutional conditions in the County’s Jail, a system plagued by severe overcrowding, outdated facilities, and chronic understaffing.  In 2014, we defeated the defendants’ motions to dismiss and obtained a unique ruling holding that our clients could assert ADA Title III claims against the Jail’s private medical provider.  See Hernandez v. County of Monterey, 70 F.Supp.3d 963 (N.D. Cal. 2014).  The federal court subsequently certified a class of the approximately 950 prisoners in the Jail, along with a sub-class of prisoners with disabilities.  See Hernandez v. County of Monterey, 305 F.R.D. 132 (N.D. Cal. 2015).  On April 14, 2015, the court granted a sweeping preliminary injunction on behalf of the class and sub-class, finding rampant violations of the Constitution and federal law.  See Hernandez v. County of Monterey, 110 F. Supp. 3d 929 (N.D. Cal. 2015). The court approved the parties’ settlement on August 18, 2015, which requires defendants to comply with the requirements of the preliminary injunction and to develop and implement a comprehensive set of plans to enhance services at the Jail.  In November 2015, the Court approved a $4.8 million dollar award of fees and costs to counsel for the plaintiff class.
• Estate of Nunuha v. State of Hawaii: RBGG represented the mother and son of Bronson Nunuha, a young Hawaii prisoner who was brutally murdered at a Corrections Corporation of America private prison in Arizona, when two prison gang members entered his unlocked cell and stabbed him to death. The wrongful death lawsuit alleged that the death was preventable were it not for the prison’s inadequate security policies and practices, and the State of Hawaii’s lack of oversight. We obtained a confidential settlement in the case.
• Estate of Medina v. State of Hawaii: RBGG represented the mother, sister, and two aunts of Clifford Medina, a young developmentally disabled Hawaii prisoner who was murdered by his cellmate at a Corrections Corporation of America private prison in Arizona, less than four months after Bronson Nunuha was killed in the same housing unit. The wrongful death lawsuit alleged that custody staff ignored clear warning signs that Clifford Medina was in danger, including threats made by the killer the day before the murder. We obtained a confidential settlement in the case.
• Software Consulting Vendor v. Fortune 500 Technology Company:  We provided advice and counselling to a software consulting vendor in confidential disputes over deliverables and payments under a complex set of consulting agreements.