Alexander F. "Alex" Stuart

About Alexander

Alexander Stuart leads Murphy Austin’s Insurance Coverage and Bad Faith Litigation practice team. Alex has more than four decades of experience practicing law in insurance coverage and bad faith litigation, with a particular focus in commercial insurance litigation involving business, real estate, construction and professional liability matters. He represents policyholders in state and federal courts at both the trial and appellate levels. Alex also represents clients in real estate and business litigation, and serves as a mediator in complex insurance cases. Devoting his practice to the delivery of creative, cost-effective legal solutions to complex problems, Alex uses a variety of pretrial procedures to test legal theories in advance of trial, saving clients significant legal expenses. While he has tried cases to verdict, his strategy is to use pretrial procedures and mediation as a method for resolving litigation disputes, often before a suit becomes necessary. Alex represents policyholders in first-party and third-party insurance disputes, and also assists other trial lawyers with the resolution of insurance issues, providing counsel on coverage and communicating with insurers to address key coverage issues and the bad faith consequences for not resolving claims in a timely manner. This support often includes a combination of inside mediation and outside mediation communications focused on developing an evidentiary record of an insurer’s breach of duty, crucial to the successful resolution of matters when the parties are engaged in multiple mediation sessions over a protracted period. Prior to joining Murphy Austin, Alex was a founding partner at Willoughby, Stuart, Bening & Cook, one of the first specialty insurance coverage and bad faith practices in Northern California. Alex earned his J.D. from Santa Clara University School of Law and received an A.B. in Rhetoric from the University of California, Berkeley. He has been named in The Best Lawyers in America since 2006 and has been listed as a Northern California Super Lawyer since 2004.

Practice Areas

Education

• Santa Clara University, JD, graduated 1980
• University of California Berkeley, A.B., Rhetoric, graduated 1977

Bar Admissions

• California, State Bar of California
• California, U.S. District Court (All California Districts)
• United States, U.S. Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit

Languages