Consumer Attorneys of San Diego — CASD — is the principal plaintiff bar organization for San Diego County. The organization's Personal Injury section is one of its largest internal communities and serves as the central coordinating point for San Diego County PI practice across the auto, premises, medical malpractice, and product-liability dockets.
From SDCTLA to CASD
CASD's institutional lineage runs through the San Diego County Trial Lawyers Association, the organization's earlier name. The rebrand to Consumer Attorneys of San Diego paralleled similar transitions at other plaintiff bar organizations during the post-2000 expansion of consumer-protection plaintiff practice. The mission and membership scope have remained recognizable across the rename; the organization continues to focus principally on plaintiff-side civil litigation.
Section Structure
CASD organizes its practice work through a section structure rather than as a single undifferentiated membership. Sections active in 2026 include personal injury, medical malpractice, product liability, employment, mass torts, and consumer-protection litigation. Members typically affiliate with multiple sections based on practice scope.
The Personal Injury section anchors the largest practice community within the organization. Section programming includes regular practice meetings, focused CLE, settlement and verdict roundtables, and dedicated subcommittees for emerging-issue tracking.
The CASD Annual Seminar
CASD's annual seminar is the organization's principal educational event and a fixture of the San Diego County plaintiff bar calendar. Programming runs across multiple tracks — trial advocacy, settlement strategy, evidence handling, voir dire approaches calibrated to San Diego juries, and panels addressing developments at the California Supreme Court and Court of Appeal level.
Attendance routinely includes attorneys from beyond San Diego County, particularly from the Los Angeles and Orange County plaintiff bars. The cross-bar participation produces an annual moment of California plaintiff-PI coordination that supplements the larger CAALA Las Vegas event.
Amicus and Legislative Posture
CASD's amicus practice participates in California appellate and Supreme Court cases with PI-doctrine significance. Recent participation has touched the Hospital Lien Act under Civil Code § 3045.1, MICRA cap interpretation, and the development of the Howell/Pebley framework around medical-bill admissibility at trial.
Legislative engagement at the Sacramento level coordinates with CAALA, OCTLA, and the other California regional associations. At the local level, CASD tracks San Diego County Superior Court rule changes, San Diego City Council ordinances with PI relevance, and San Diego County jury-administration changes.
The Auto, Premises, and Mil-Tort Mix
San Diego County's docket carries a few characteristics that differentiate it from other large California venues:
- Cross-border auto cases. The county's southern boundary produces a workload of cases involving conduct or parties in both California and Baja California. Procedural issues around service, evidence collection, and choice of law surface more often than in counties without an international border.
- Military and federal-defendant cases. The county's substantial military and federal-facility presence produces a steady caseload of Federal Tort Claims Act matters, on-base injury claims, and cases with federal-defendant complications.
- Coastal premises liability. Tourism-driven commercial properties, beach-adjacent venues, and hospitality-industry premises produce a recognizable share of the county's plaintiff docket.
CASD's PI section programming reflects these regional characteristics in its CLE calendar and section roundtables.
What Membership Provides
For San Diego County plaintiff counsel, CASD membership produces:
- Section-specific listservs and practice-resource libraries calibrated to the regional docket.
- The annual seminar's CLE programming, available at member rates substantially below commercial alternatives.
- Settlement and verdict data through the section's roundtables and the organization's published recaps.
- Cross-bar introductions through the joint social calendar with CAALA, OCTLA, and the broader California plaintiff-bar community.
2026 Posture
CASD enters 2026 with stable section membership and a programming calendar that has settled into its post-pandemic shape. The Personal Injury section continues to function as the central coordinating point for San Diego County plaintiff PI practice, with active participation in California amicus and legislative coordination through the broader regional-association community.
For attorneys whose practice center is San Diego County or whose work routinely runs through San Diego venues, CASD membership and PI-section affiliation are the default working assumption.
For Non-Member Counsel
For attorneys not currently affiliated with CASD but handling San Diego County matters, the organization's annual seminar accepts non-member registration and is one of the more accessible entry points for out-of-county counsel building relationships in the regional plaintiff bar. The section publications and verdict-and-settlement recaps remain useful reference for case valuation in San Diego County venues even for non-members.
Cross-affiliation with the other California regional associations is routine. CASD members handling cases beyond San Diego County maintain concurrent membership in CAALA for Los Angeles County work, in OCTLA for Orange County matters, or in SCCTLA for Bay Area cases. For cross-border practice with Arizona and Nevada, the relevant points of contact are AzAJ and NJA.