CAROLYN SHIELDS

LIU & SHIELDS LLP

4160 Main Street, Suite 208A

Flushing, New York 11355

Tel:  718-463-1868

Fax:  718-463-2883

liushieldslaw@gmail.com

 

Background:

Carolyn Shields is an American with nearly 50 years of experience practicing law. Her interest in Chinese language and culture dates from her college studies, when she majored in Chinese Language and Literature. As a law student at the University of Connecticut, she was Editor-in-Chief of the University of Connecticut Law Review and graduated magna cum laude from the University of Connecticut School of Law. She received her Masters Degree in Law from Tulane University. Carolyn is admitted to practice in the Supreme Court of the United States and in the state and federal courts of New York and California, and has nearly 30 years of litigation experience in the courts of New York, California, New Hampshire, Connecticut, New Jersey, Maryland, Alabama, Michigan, Oregon, Washington, and Montana, with some of her noteworthy cases appearing in the legal literature. She has published articles in the law reviews, and has written a casebook, Cases and Materials on Admiralty and Maritime Law, which she used in teaching at Loyola University. Carolyn has also taught Commercial Law, Family Law, Corporation Law, Tax Law, and Maritime Law. Further details about Carolyn appear on the resume link on this site.

 

Experience

            Partner, Liu & Shields LLP, Flushing, New York, 2005-present

Partner, Bailey & Partners, Santa Monica, California, 1999-2005

Partner, Lane Powell Spears Lubersky LLP, Los Angeles, California,

1993-1999

Associate: Williams Woolley Cogswell Nakazawa & Russell,

Long Beach, California, 1991-1993

Associate:  Hodgson, Russ, Andrews, Woods & Goodyear, Buffalo, New York,

1983-1985

Adjunct Professor of Law, Loyola Law School, 1995-1997 (Admiralty Law)

Visiting Assistant Professor of Law, Indiana University School of Law,

1985‑1986 (UCC); Chase College of Law, 1986‑1987 (Corporations,

Securities, Tax, Conflicts)

Clerk to the Honorable John A. Speziale, Chief Justice, Supreme Court of the State of

Connecticut, 1981-1982

 

Areas of Practice

Litigation in federal and state courts, including trial and appellate practice:

            International Law; Corporation Law; Admiralty and Maritime Law; 

            Intellectual Property; Commercial Litigation

 

Admitted to Practice

Supreme Court of the United States

Federal Courts, New York and California

State Courts, New York and California

 

Education

Tulane Law School (LL.M., Admiralty, 1991)

University of Connecticut (J.D., 1981, High Honors;

Editor-in-Chief, Connecticut Law Review)

Indiana University (A.B., Chinese Language and Literature, 1969)

 

 

 

 

 

Publications

 

Recent Developments: Liens, 1 Benedict=s Maritime Bulletin No. 3 (2003)

 

Recent Developments in State and Federal Evidence Law, 34 J. Maritime Law & Commerce 1 (2003) (co-author)

 

Daubert, Proof of a Prior, and the Soliton: Bernart Towboat Co. v. USS Chandler (DDG 996), 34 J. Maritime Law & Commerce 173 (2003) (co-author)

 

Contributor, Marine Protection and Indemnity Policy Annotations Project (Chapter 3:

Loss to Property By Collision and Other Causes, published by the Maritime Law

Association of the United States, 2001) (co-author)

           

Cases and Materials in Admiralty and Maritime Law (used at Loyola Law School, 1995-

1997)

 

Spoliation of Evidence: Joinder and Jury Trial, Lane Powell Spears Lubersky LLP Admiralty News, Winter 1996, at 6

 

Sovereign Immunity in Connecticut:  Survey and Economic Analysis, 13 Conn. L. Rev.

293 (1981)

 

Legal Remedies for Overurbanization: The Ghanaian Experience, 18 U.C.L.A. L. Rev. 252 (1970) (coauthor)

 

Book Review, 46 Ind. L.J. 442 (1971) (coauthor)

 

Languages

 

Some French, German, Russian, and Chinese

 

 Activities

 

Violin (professional and amateur); Sailing

 

 

Appendix:  Selected Transactional and Litigation Matters

 

Vickers Aerospace v. Air Mauritius, Case No. 2000cv00960, S.D.N.Y., November 7, 2003.

Products liability case involving fire damage sustained by two commercial aircraft and litigated in France and in New York. Handled New York and French litigation, including whether an exculpatory clause in a contract between an airframe manufacturer and an airline could be enforced against the airline by a component manufacturer, and whether the economic loss doctrine barred a tort claim against the component manufacturer where the product damaged only itself.  Prevailed in New York federal district court and in the Commercial Court of France.

 

Set up international company to own and operate fleet of cruise ships, including handling public offering under United States and U.S. states’ securities laws.   

 

Advised international Asian medical company and negotiated their contracts with United States businesses with the aim of protecting them from hypothetical but potential liability for mad cow disease transmitted by blood products.

 

Litigated issue of what limitations period applies in 10(b)(5) securities litigation in absence of federal statute of limitations, including effect of states’ borrowing statutes, United States District Court, Western District of New York.

 

            Mercury v. Direct TV, Superior Court of the State of California, Los Angeles County Commercial dispute between Argentinian business against distributor of satellite television services in Latin America, settled.

 

In re: Air Crash off Point Mugu, California, on January 31, 2002, MDL Docket No. 00-1343, United States District Court for the North District of California.

In this complex general maritime law aviation disaster, prevailed on motion for summary judgment on behalf of a remote successor of the component manufacturer.

 

            Ventura Packers, Inc. v. F/V JEANINE KATHLEEN  in rem, 305 F.3d 913, 2002 A.M.C. 2248 (9th Cir. 2002), cert. denied, 538 U.S. 1000, 123 S. Ct. 1910, 155 L. Ed. 2d 827 (2002), rev’d on appeal from final judgment of dismissal after remand,424 F.3d 852 (9th Cir. 2005), settled September 2006, discussed in Shields, Recent Developments: Liens, 1 Benedict=s Maritime Bulletin No. 3 (2003).

In rem admiralty case to enforce a claimed maritime lien for necessaries.  Settled before trial.

 

Vodusek v. Bayliner Marine Corporation, 71 F.3d 148 (4th Cir. 1995), included in R. Force & A. Yiannopoulos, Admiralty and Maritime Law 1-115 (1997); discussed in Shields, Spoliation of Evidence; Joinder and Jury Trial, Lane Powell Spears Lubersky LLP Admiralty News, Winter 1996, at 6.

Maritime wrongful death case. Successful trial and appeal on behalf of boat manufacturer. The Fourth Circuit held that the jury was properly permitted to draw an adverse inference from plaintiff=s spoliation of evidence, and that there is a right to a jury trial in federal court when there is admiralty jurisdiction but not complete diversity of citizenship.

 

Cunard Lines Ltd v. United States, S.D.N.Y., 1997.

Maritime action brought on behalf of Cunard against the Government under the Suits in Admiralty Act for losses arising out of the grounding of the QE2 in Vineyard Sound.

 

            Wide range of construction litigation and arbitration, including claims on behalf of owners against contractors, defenses against lien claimants, and claims on behalf of subcontractors against general contractors, 1981-present.  Maldonado v. J&K Construction Management Corp., involving owners’ claims against contractor for alleged construction defects and delay, in mediation before AAA.

 

            Estate of Douglas Hou Jiang v. Tichko et al., Supreme Court of the State of New York,

Wrongful death and survival case, Queens County (arising out of the March 17, 2007 deaths of 4 persons, including 3 children, on the New York State Thruway, when defendant’s truck collided with the decedents’ car, pending).

 

In re American Trading Transportation Co., Inc., United States District Court for the Central District of California, United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, Superior Court of the State of California.

Oil spill case prior to the Oil Pollution Act of 1990. Participated in discovery and briefing in Shipowner=s Limitation of Liability action and related actions arising out of an oil spill off the coast of California.

 

Wilkinson v. Boats Unlimited, Inc. and Bayliner Marine Corporation, 236 Conn. 78, 670 A.2d 1296 (1996).

Maritime products liability case. Prevailed in the Superior Court of Washington and in the Supreme Court of Connecticut, arguing that a default judgment, which predated firm’s involvement in the case, was void ab initio and should be set aside on the ground that the Connecticut court lacked personal jurisdiction over the foreign corporation.

 

 

Hudson v. National Union Fire Insurance Company of Pittsburgh, Pa., Superior Court of the State of California for Los Angeles County, August 1998.

Insurance coverage case.  Prevailed on insurers motion for summary judgment, which was granted on the ground that there was no coverage or the potential for coverage for third-party plaintiffs= claims against the insured in the underlying action for defamation related to the termination of plaintiffs= employment with the insured. 

 

Fuimaono v. Nicky Lou, Inc., Superior Court of the State of California for Los Angeles County, 1995 (Jones Act case).

Maritime Jones Act case. Obtained dismissal before trial through motion to quash service of summons and complaint on the Washington vessel owner on the ground that the court lacked personal jurisdiction over it and through motion to dismiss the complaint against the other defendant on the ground of forum non conveniens, the events having occurred in the South Pacific and the witnesses being in Tahiti, American Samoa, and the Seychelles Islands. 

 

CIGNA Property & Casualty Insurance Company v. Bayliner Marine Corporation, United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, 1994.

Maritime products liability case. Successful nonjury trial on behalf of defendant boat manufacturer in maritime products liability action for property damage.  Issues included the East River doctrine and what constitutes the product, but the case was decided on the ground that the product was not defective.