Joseph Chairez is a member of the Litigation Group of the Costa Mesa office of Baker Hostetler. His experience includes assisting companies with employment litigation, insurance coverage, product liability, real estate, environmental cost recovery, and construction defect.

Mr. Chairez is a business trial lawyer who has successfully litigated numerous complex business and employment matters in state, federal and appellate courts. For employers, he has handled multiplaintiff discrimination, retaliation, harassment and wage and hour litigation.

He also has a subspecialty in insurance coverage litigation on behalf of individual and corporate policyholders, which has produced millions of dollars of insurance policy benefits for his clients. Mr. Chairez is skilled in handling both the underlying litigation and the associated coverage issues with an emphasis on Error & Omissions, Officers & Directors, and General Liability Policies.

In addition, Mr. Chairez is also a member of Baker Hostetler's International Team. He is experienced in drafting legislation and negotiating and reviewing international contracts, treaties and bond offerings. As a former senior legislative counsel to one of the U.S. Trust Territories, he represented several Pacific Island legislators before the U.S. Senate, U.S. House of Representatives and United Nations.

Mr. Chairez has been a Panel Arbitrator for the Orange County Superior Court since 1992. He is the President of the Orange County Bar Association Charitable Fund and immediate past President of the Orange County Bar Association. Mr. Chairez is also a past president of both the Orange County Hispanic Bar Association and Celtic Bar Association. He is a member and new co-chair of the California Commission on Access to Justice and a member of the California State Bar, Pipeline Diversity Task Force. A frequent speaker at continuing legal education seminars, Mr. Chairez has spoken before the Southern California Chapter of the American Corporate Counsel Association, the California Redevelopment Association, the Insurance Education Association, and Hispanic Board of Realtors. He has contributed to many publications including the Orange County Lawyer, California Minority Counsel Annual Report.

Mr. Chairez has continuously been named a Southern California “Super Lawyer” by Law & Politics and the publishers of Los Angeles Magazine since 2004.