Steven D. Manning is the Assistant Managing Partner of Manning Kass. He is a member of the Governmental Entity Liability team.

Mr. Manning has deep roots in the Los Angeles community. Son of former Los Angeles City Fire Department Chief, Donald O. Manning, he was born and raised in the city. Mr. Manning is a graduate of the California State University, Los Angeles, and Whittier Law School, where he was chief research editor of the Whittier Law Review and author of an article on securities regulations. He is an experienced trial lawyer in both state and federal court and has taught seminars in trial preparation, trial advocacy, and the defense of federal constitutional law. Earlier in his career, Mr. Manning led the team of attorneys at the firm who concentrate in defending police officers, sheriff's deputies, and other public officials in lawsuits arising out of the performance of their official duties. He also organized a group of law enforcement defense attorneys outside the firm in both the Greater Los Angeles area and in San Diego County, who would meet to share information and to develop common strategies for defending police civil liability suits.

Mr. Manning has also been called to testify before Congress on issues regarding federal law and police civil liability. Most recently, he received the Alumnus of the Year Award for Outstanding Professional Achievement from Whittier Law School and has been accepted as a life member of the National Registry of Who's Who.

Mr. Manning coauthored an op-ed article in the Los Angeles Times, which analyzed the Kolts Commission Report. In December 1991, Mr. Manning orally argued an emergency appeal before the Ninth Circuit on a widely publicized county-wide injunction against the L.A. County Sheriff's Department. In November 1992, he was profiled in a cover article in California Lawyer about attorneys who handle high-profile police civil liability cases. Mr. Manning has been named a 2004–2011 Super Lawyer, a distinction awarded to no more than five percent of attorneys in a state who have attained a high degree of peer recognition and professional achievement. 

Mr. Manning is a Senior Fellow of the Litigation Counsel of America, the Trial Lawyer Honorary Society, and a member of the Trial Law Institute and Diversity Law Institute.