July 24, 2025 (Los Angeles, CA) – Hawkins Parnell & Young partners Elaine Fresch and David Johanson were selected to the 2025 Leaders of Influence: Litigators and Trial Attorneys list by the Los Angeles Business Journal. The annual publication recognizes "the very best litigators and trial attorneys in the region," who are the "trusted advisors you want in your corner in court."

Fresch is a go-to attorney for construction industry clients navigating high-stakes litigation and complex disputes. She has consistently received prestigious accolades, including being named to the National Law Journal's list of Real Estate/Construction Law Trailblazers, the Daily Journal's Top 100 Women Lawyers in California, and Thomson Reuters' Top 50 Women in Southern California Super Lawyers each year since 2014. In 2024, she was honored as one of the Los Angeles Times' Legal Visionaries and named a finalist for the 2025 Outside Defense Counsel of the Year by CLM.

Johanson represents companies, fiduciaries, and senior executives and directors in high-stakes and bet-the-company litigation nationwide, as well as in parallel investigations by regulatory agencies such as the U.S. Department of Labor, Internal Revenue Service, and Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. He has won landmark trials and litigated complex business, ERISA, employment, and class action disputes nationwide. Johanson's track record of regularly obtaining dismissals, defense judgments, and strategic settlements spans securing one of the only defense victories in an ESOP valuation and ERISA fiduciary lawsuit filed by the U.S. Department of Labor during the past 50 years to successfully arguing appeals in four federal circuits with multiple cases briefed to the U.S. Supreme Court. 

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