Mr Paul Lawrence Starita | Attorney

Paul Starita is a Partner at Singleton Schreiber with over 30 years of experience as a trial attorney. He exclusively represents plaintiffs in catastrophic personal injury and mass tort matters in State and Federal courts. He leads the Fire Litigation practice group at Singleton Schreiber and litigates a wide range of cases including Personal Injury, Fire, Mass Torts, and more.

Before joining the Singleton Schreiber team, Paul served the people of San Diego and Imperial counties as an Assistant U.S. Attorney for over 18 years. Paul represented the United States, its agencies, officers, and employees in a wide variety of civil litigation matters, including cases involving industrial and vehicle accidents, premises liability, wrongful death, medical malpractice, constitutional torts, and employment. In addition, Paul prosecuted civil health care and procurement fraud cases under the False Claims Act.

Paul was a federal prosecutor for 10 years before serving as a civil trial attorney. He investigated and prosecuted more than 1,000 felony cases involving corruption, drug trafficking/organized crime, human trafficking, money laundering, and violent crime. He has tried more than 50 jury and bench trials in Federal court.

Prior to joining the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Paul spent two years at a mid-size law firm in Newport Beach, California, where he litigated land use claims for individual landowners and developers throughout Southern California.

Paul proudly served our nation as a U.S. Marine, on active duty and in the Reserve. He attained the rank of Colonel and served in various leadership and legal roles, including Military Trial Judge and Appellate Judge on the Navy-Marine Corps Court of Criminal Appeals. For many years, Paul also advised senior government officials on environmental compliance and litigation matters in the Marine Corps’ western region.

He also served as the Marine Corps’ lead counsel on regional Clean Air Act matters involving hazardous air pollutants / toxic air contaminants, emissions trading, compliance with national ambient air quality standards, mobile source emissions, stationary source compliance, and fuels.

Early in his career, he had a robust trial practice as a military prosecutor involving criminal conduct ranging from DUI to murder. While our nation was at war, Paul was handpicked and returned to active duty to defend Marines accused of war crimes related to combat operations in Iraq.

Paul attended Thomas M. Cooley Law School and holds a Master of Laws (LLM) with a concentration in Environmental Law from the University of San Diego School of Law.

Paul is currently an adjunct professor at the University of San Diego School of Law, where he instructs first-year law students on civil trial practice.