The Seyfarth Shaw Law Firm has been recognized again by the Corporate Equality Index as one of the leading business firms to have a five-star LGBT workplace environment.
Days before the rule was set to take effect, a federal judge in Texas blocked a U.S. Department of Labor rule that would have extended overtime pay to upwards of 4 million salaried workers. The Department of Labor has appealed. The decisions in the meantime could produce confusion, a Chicago employment lawyer said.
Groupon will need to open its doors and computers to federal workplace discrimination regulators, a federal judge has ruled, saying she did not believe the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission’s demands to pore over potentially large amounts of documents related to Groupon’s hiring practices were excessive, even though the document request came as part of the EEOC’s investigation of a single allegation of racial hiring discrimination against the company.
In a landmark decision, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) has ruled that graduate students employed at private universities have the right to unionize. And while benefits won in potential collective bargaining may increase costs and tuition, it may also open colleges and universities to greater risks of being sued.
A decision in favor of a suburban Chicago chain of pancake houses in a wage dispute over how much it pays its tipped staff could have ramifications far beyond the local restaurant landscape.
A suburban Chicago chain of pancake houses has stacked another win in its ongoing legal fight with former servers who claimed they weren’t paid enough for work they did in addition to waiting tables at the restaurants.
Chicago-based international law firm Seyfarth Shaw and financial services firm Northern Trust has beaten back a federal RICO lawsuit, for now, after a federal judge said the president of an underwriting company didn’t do enough to establish the companies, engaged in racketeering when they allegedly misled him into running the tens of millions of dollars he received from the sale of his company stock through an abusive tax shelter scheme.
The federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission issued regulations last month about what employers can and cannot do to encourage or even require employee participation in employer-sponsored wellness programs, while still complying with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and the Genetic Information Non-discrimination Act (GINA).But those new rules have come amid pitched legal battles over whether the commission’s interpretation of those law is even correct.
Employers can still ask employees to sign contracts sending disputes over overtime or other wage and hour issues to arbitration, bypassing the courts. But a federal appeals panel in Chicago said any attempts to force employees to sign such agreements as a condition of employment violates federal law, leaving such contracts unenforceable.
Two groups of investors, collectively numbering 56, who all said they were victims of an abusive tax avoidance scheme masterminded by former Seyfarth Shaw LLP partner John Rogers, have sued a western Pennsylvania-based law firm for allegedly waiting too long to bring their court actions against Rogers and Seyfarth, and making other unforced errors which they said cost them the chance to win settlements or court awarded damages.
The odds that an individual shop or restaurant could be hit with a disability equal access lawsuit under Title III of the Americans with Disabilities Act remains small. But the likelihood is increasing, as more lawyers take aim at shops of all sizes, including owners of small mom-and-pop shops in older buildings.
2015 proved to be a record-breaking year for the number of lawsuits filed in federal court under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), and 2016 will probably break that record, a Seyfarth Shaw attorney says.
CHICAGO — A federal judge has ruled Chicago Police officers are not entitled under federal law to overtime pay for off–duty work done on mobile devices, like Blackberrys, issued by the Chicago Police Department. And this decision could have consequences for all employers, according to a legal observer.
A federal court has denied a man’s attempt to sue his former employer, a Schaumburg-based operator of several for-profit career education colleges, over its termination of a bonus incentive program he says cost him thousands. U.S. Magistrate Judge Geraldine Soat Brown granted summary judgment in December to defendant Career Education Corporation, which operates Le Cordon Bleu College, American Intercontinental University and Colorado Technical University.
CHICAGO — The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) will take on wholesale retailer Costco in a jury trial on behalf of a female employee who was allegedly harassed and stalked while working at the company’s Glenview warehouse.
As the calendar moves into 2016 and beyond, the hospitality industry could see a growing shift among restaurants to no-tipping policies, should restaurateurs across the country see many happy returns for the handful of dining establishments that have already eliminated tipping – and see whether the change might help delete lawsuits over the treatment of tipped employees from the country’s litigation menu.
A federal judge has sided with an assistant manager who lost her job at a shoe store after she called police to curb a potential shoplifting incident in progress, ruling the woman can proceed with a lawsuit against her former employer for allegedly violating Illinois’ whistleblower law.
In the past 25 years, employers of all sizes have faced a mounting number of lawsuits brought under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act by current and past employees who argue they have been shortchanged. In 2004, for instance, when rules changed governing how the law would be interpreted and enforced, FLSA-related litigation spiked. And business groups and lawyers on both sides believe the country may be poised for a similar jump in FLSA court activity.
This is the first installment in a series examining labor litigation brought under the Fair Labor Standards Act. In Chicago and nationwide, the number of wage and hour lawsuits filed under the FLSA has been steadily on the rise for most of the past 25 years. And area lawyers expect to see yet another spike in litigation as employers and employees alike see what will come of further changes to the rules governing enforcement of the FLSA by the U.S. Department of Labor.
Dangerous alterations to a defunct power plant in Robbins, allegedly including disconnected aircraft warning lights on a tower structure, disabled fire suppression systems, and cut, live wires left easily accessible, have prompted the owner of the property to file suit against two companies he allowed to remove equipment from the site. The suit was filed July 31 in Cook County Circuit Court.
