Elizabeth Chilton

Christensen, Glaser, Fink, Jacobs, Weil & Shapiro, LLP, Los Angeles, USA

Beth Chilton was born in 1958 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She received her Bachelor of Arts degree from UCLA in 1976, where she graduated Phi Beta Kappa and summa cum laude. In 1983, she received her Juris Doctorate from UCLA and was awarded Order of the Coif.

Ms. Chilton started her career at the Century City firm of Greenberg, Glusker, Fields, Claman, & Machtinger, where she became a partner in the litigation department, specializing in real estate litigation and appellate work. She joined Christensen, Glaser, Fink, Jacobs, Weil & Shapiro, LLP in 1997.

At Christensen Glaser, Ms. Chilton continues to specialize in the areas of real estate litigation and appellate work. In her real estate practice, she has represented developers, landlords, and homeowners in a wide variety of matters, including CEQA, land use, and zoning litigation; inverse condemnation and takings cases; and litigation over the purchase, sale, development, leasing, and partition of commercial, residential, and industrial property. She has represented clients before California state and federal courts, and administrative agencies such as the California Coastal Commission.

The bulk of Ms. Chilton's practice is devoted to appellate work. Over the past two decades, she has handled scores of appeals and writ proceedings in the California courts of appeal, the California Supreme Court, the Ninth Circuit, and other federal appellate courts. Among the many different types of cases Ms. Chilton has argued or briefed are intellectual property disputes; insurance coverage questions; legal malpractice cases; employment litigation, including claims of sexual harassment and discrimination, and wrongful termination; and questions of bankruptcy, probate, divorce, entertainment, and administrative law.

Recently Ms. Chilton obtained from the Ninth Circuit the reversal of a multi-million dollar judgment entered against her client, a prominent musician, in a breach of contract suit brought by a Las Vegas hotel over the star's inability to perform a highly publicized concert. In another recent matter handled by Ms. Chilton, a case of first impression involving interpretation and application of the California law requiring the licensing of talent agents, the California Supreme Court held that there is no statute of limitations on an entertainer's use of the statue as a defense against the claims of unlicensed talent agents.

Ms. Chilton is a member of the California State Bar and the Century City Bar Association. She lives in Calabasas, California with her three children.