Hon. Amy D. Hogue (Ret.) is a distinguished former complex court jurist known for her practical approach, friendly demeanor, and insightful written decisions. She had extensive experience as a private mediator prior to her judicial appointment and routinely settled cases throughout her judicial career.
Before her elevation to the bench, Judge Hogue spent 23 years at the same law firm: 12 years as an equity partner at what is now known as Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman LLP and 11 years at Lillick & McHose. At Pillsbury, Judge Hogue was Co-Chair of the Intellectual Property Group in Los Angeles.
In her last few years at Pillsbury, Judge Hogue developed a passion for working as a private mediator, successfully mediating settlements in at least 40 business, employment, personal injury, and copyright infringement cases. In her 20 years on the bench, Judge Hogue spent seven years in a complex civil litigation court, two years in writs and receivers, six months on assignment in Division Three of the Second Appellate District, two years as Assistant Supervising Judge of Civil, and several years in a general jurisdiction civil court.
In private practice, Judge Hogue was lead counsel in numerous jury trials, bench trials, and arbitrations, representing both plaintiffs and defendants. She also argued multiple cases in the California Courts of Appeals, the California Supreme Court, and the Ninth Circuit. Judge Hogue prosecuted and defended a wide variety of commercial cases involving contracts, frauds, lender liability, intellectual property, real estate, partnerships, and corporate governance disputes for clients in the banking, real estate, manufacturing, advertising, and media business. She also prosecuted wrongful-termination actions for high-level executives and defended numerous employment cases.
As a practicing attorney, Judge Hogue defended television networks and publishers in scores of defamation, right of publicity, and invasion-of-privacy actions. She handled copyright infringement cases involving motion pictures (Raiders of the Lost Ark, Reds, Jaws), television shows (All in the Family, The Bob Newhart Show), characters (James Bond, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles), and a television theme song. As described by The Atlantic Monthly, Judge Hogue was “œfamous in the California Bar for a delicate cross-examination of the Wheel of Fortune letter-turner and celebrity Vanna White.” (TABLOID LAW, THE ATLANTIC).
On the bench, Judge Hogue handled a wide variety of complex and coordinated cases. Recently, she spearheaded the Court's adoption of three model wage and hour settlement agreements which are now available to attorneys on the Los Angeles Superior Court's website: a class action settlement agreement and class notice, a class action/PAGA settlement agreement, and a PAGA settlement agreement. Judge Hogue drafted the model agreements and Co-chaired the 2022 Ad Hoc Wage and Hour Committee of 16 plaintiff and defense practitioners, which approved the drafts with minor changes. The model agreements are designed to streamline the Court's settlement approval process and benefit the attorneys by simplifying negotiations, reducing wordsmithing, and clarifying what the Court needs to see in order to grant approval.
The Chief Justice appointed Judge Hogue to the Judicial Council's Advisory Committee on Civil Jury Instructions Judicial Council CACI committee. She chaired the Los Angeles Superior Court's Media Committee for 15 years and served on its Judicial Education Civil Subcommittee, teaching more than 50 courses to judges and attorneys on diverse topics including Anti-SLAPP, class actions, employment, PAGA, judicial leadership, product liability, torts, evidence, media, expert witnesses, misclassification of employees, discovery, motions, and jury selection.