Benjamin Schenk

Benjamin Schenk primarily practices in the areas of catastrophic personal injury, wrongful death, mass torts, and complex business litigation.

On August 4, 2026, the Superior Court of California, County of San Francisco, appointed Benjamin to the six-member Plaintiffs’ Steering Committee in In re ChatGPT Product Liability Cases, JCCP No. 5431, the coordinated proceeding against OpenAI and Microsoft that tests whether long-established product liability principles apply to generative AI. The cases allege that ChatGPT lacked adequate safeguards for users in mental health crises and engaged in the unlicensed practice of medicine.

The Schenk Law Firm represents the parents of Bowen Wan in Wan v. OpenAI, Inc., et al., a wrongful death case filed in San Francisco Superior Court on October 27, 2026, and reported by The New York Times. Benjamin is one of the firm’s attorneys on the case, which the firm filed to join JCCP No. 5431, the coordinated proceeding where he serves on the Plaintiffs’ Steering Committee.

Benjamin serves on the Board of Directors of Consumer Attorneys of California and the University of San Diego School of Law Alumni Board, and co-chairs the Engagement Committee of the American Association for Justice’s New Lawyers Division. He is also a board member of the Lawrence Family JCC and the Burn Institute.

Born and raised in San Diego, Benjamin graduated from Dartmouth College, magna cum laude, with a major in Government and minors in Theater and Public Policy. While at Dartmouth, he achieved an academic Citation—an honor granted to only 2.4% of students for displaying “unusual talent” in a class—for his performances in Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet and Molière’s Tartuffe. As a trial attorney at The Schenk Law Firm, Benjamin applies his advanced theatrical training to connect with jurors in the courtroom.

After Dartmouth, Benjamin worked as a Product Manager at Bridgewater Associates (the world’s largest hedge fund founded by Ray Dalio). He later founded and continues to run The Civic Group LLC, a commercial real estate investment and asset management firm. Benjamin uses his financial and transactional experience to secure fully valued settlements with insurance companies.

Benjamin has negotiated a $5,000,000 settlement for his clients in a highly contested wrongful death action, and he obtained a favorable verdict in a bench trial in which he represented two former San Diego Superior Court judges in a real property dispute. In addition to representing clients in litigation, he serves as general counsel to a select group of high-net-worth families who own and operate complex, multigenerational businesses.