Mark Austin

Mr. Austin is a partner at the law firm of Burke, Williams & Sorensen, LLP, where his legal practice focuses on business and municipal litigation, with emphases on real estate litigation, land use litigation, municipal tort defense (including employment-related torts), partnership disputes, and environmental litigation. Mr. Austin has extensive trial experience, having handled multiple successful jury trials, bench trials, and arbitrations, and has successfully argued before the California Court of Appeal over a dozen times. Since 2007, Mr. Austin has been consistently named a California “Rising Star” by Super Lawyers magazine due to his demonstrated skill in civil litigation. Mr. Austin began his career at Rutan & Tucker, LLP, where he focused on litigation for and against public entities, with cases including complex land-use matters, employment and discrimination disputes, constitutional claims, and wrongful-death tort claims. Since that time, Mr. Austin has expanded his practice to include complex commercial disputes on behalf of developers and businesses of all sizes, general real-estate litigation, and environmental litigation. In his several years of practice, Mr. Austin’s clients have included residential and commercial developers, nationally recognized private companies, cities, counties, small businesses, and private homeowners. In June of 2018, Mr. Austin transferred his practice to the law firm of Burke, Williams & Sorensen, LLP. Mr. Austin has a number of published appellate opinions, including City of Cerritos v. Cerritos Taxpayers Assoc., et al. (2010) 183 Cal.App.4th 1417 (lead counsel), In re County of Monterey Initiative Matter (N.D. Cal. 2006) 427 Fed.Supp.2d 958 (lead counsel), and City of Long Beach v. Department of Industrial Relations (2004) 34 Cal.4th 942 (amicus).