PRACTICE AREAS
Litigation, transactions and consultation, and regulatory compliance in the following areas:

• Admiralty/maritime;
• Transportation, logistics, and warehousing;
• Insurance coverage for insurance and risk-management interests; and
• International trade.

EDUCATION

• University of San Diego School of Law, Juris Doctorate ; and
• University of Chicago, A.B. - Economics.

BAR & COURT ADMISSIONS

• State Bar of California;
• U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit;
• All United States District Courts in the State of California; and
• United States Supreme Court.

PROFESSIONAL MEMBERSHIPS

• Proctor Member: Maritime Law Association;
• Member: Association of Corporate Counsel;
• Editor: Journal of Transportation Law, Logistics & Policy (Water Section1996-1999);

George P. Hassapis
Of Counsel

5777 W. Century Blvd. Suite 1410
Los Angeles, CA 90045

Office: (310) 642-9800
Facsimile : (310) 868-2923
E-mail: gph@tradeandcargo.com

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Mr. Hassapis has been a lawyer working in the transportation industry for more than twenty years. Having passed the bar in 1990, Mr. Hassapis cut his teeth as a litigator with the firm of Fisher & Porter (which became Fisher, Porter & Kent, and ultimately Porter, Groff and Lodwick) for the first ten years of his legal career. During that time Mr. Hassapis had the opportunity to litigate cases from beginning to end as first chair trial counsel, as well as work on and argue appeals before the California Court of Appeal and the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. During this time, Mr. Hassapis’s participation in the Maritime Lawyers Association, coupled with his work in the area of marine transportation, allowed him to become a Proctor Member of the MLA. Following that firm’s disbanding in 2000, Mr. Hassapis moved his practice to the offices of Haight Brown & Bonesteel in Orange County, California where he continued to practice in the fields of Transportation, Insurance coverage and defense, maritime arrest and attachment, and general business litigation along side the late Michael Lodwick.

In 2002, Mr. Hassapis was presented with an opportunity to move in-house to become General Counsel and CTO for a trucking company in Pomona, California, Golden Eagle Express. In that role, Mr. Hassapis honed his entrepreneurial skills, learning the business side of transportation while maintaining responsibility for all legal, compliance, pollution, HR and technology issues within that 35 million dollar company. Two years later, in 2004, his former partner, Terry Groff, who was General Counsel for BAX Global Inc. offered Mr. Hassapis a position as Assistant General Counsel of that 3 billion dollar company, which Mr. Hassapis accepted in June of that year.

As the Assistant General Counsel of BAX, Mr. Hassapis furthered his education in a wide variety of issues facing transportation companies today, including: loss prevention, compliance, transportation contracts, business contracts, Information Technology licensing and contracts, human resources, employee relations, business entity formation and dissolution, mergers and acquisitions, real estate contracts, litigation management and corporate secretarial duties. In late 2005-early 2006, BAX Global Inc. (which was at the time a wholly owned subsidiary of The Brink’s Corporation) was sold to Deutsche Bahn. Mr. Hassapis assisted in the due diligence process that led up to the sale of BAX Global Inc. as well as the post-sale efforts to integrate BAX Global Inc., with another Deutsche Bahn owned company—Schenker, Inc. After the acquisition, Deutsche Bahn (which is a part of the German Government), reported revenues in excess of 32 billion Euro, annually. In 2009, as part of the integration, closed the former BAX Global Legal department, laying off all legal staff then employed at what was the former BAX Global headquarters in Irvine, California, allowing for Mr. Hassapis’ transition back to private practice with the firm of Roberts & Kehagiaras.

Mr. Hassapis is licensed before all the state and federal courts of California, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeal, and the United States Supreme Court.