Jeffrey A. Berman

Some employment trials have ended better than others for Berman, a longtime labor specialist who was held hostage in 2006 by a heavily armed interloper during a National Labor Relations Board hearing in Phoenix.

“He walked in with a bag full of guns and held us at gunpoint for about eight hours,” Berman said, noting that the disgruntled gunman had nothing to do with his case.

The man thought taking hostages was a good way to boost awareness about what he felt was an unjust termination of his wife’s employment.

“Eventually, they found his wife and she talked him out of it,” Berman said. “Last I heard, he’s still in a psychiatric hospital and has never been tried.”

Other than the extraordinarily “nerve-wracking” nature of the frightening experience, Berman said he’ll also never forget a cellphone call he made during the ordeal.

“I was able to call the general counsel for the client and tell him we were being held hostage,” Berman explained. “And I remember very distinctly when he told me that I was not allowed to bill the time.”

A more recent case unfolded far more positively for the 45-year veteran of labor and employment law, who helped successfully defend the Pac-12 Conference in a wage class action brought by former University of Southern California football player Lamar Dawson.

“His theory was … Division 1 football players should be treated as employees, because they bring in so much money,” Berman said.

Dawson sued the NCAA and the PAC-12 for what he deemed were violations of the federal Fair Labor Standards Act and the California Labor Code, which require employers to compensate individuals for performed labor. Dawson v. National Collegiate Athletic Association, 16-cv-05487-RS (N.D. Cal. April 25, 2017).

In April, California federal district court judge Richard G. Seeborg sided with the NCAA and Pac-12, however, granting the defendants’ motion to dismiss on the ground that student athletes are not employees. The case has since been appealed to the 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals.

Berman said the consequences of college football players being classified as employees “verges on the ludicrous, at least under California law,” in part because of regulations regarding mandatory rest periods and meals.

“In the middle of the nationally televised Rose Bowl game, played here in California, all of a sudden players would have to take a 10-minute break,” he said. “Or they’d all need to sit down and eat lunch for 30 minutes.”

Along with his extensive labor work, Berman frequently works with religious hospitals, universities and schools, representing these organizations in the past in both California and U.S. Supreme Court cases involving religious exemptions for state landmark regulations or anti-discrimination laws.

“I think first amendment law is incredibly important,” he said. “And I’ve represented everyone from Buddhists to Evangelicals to Catholics and Seventh-day Adventists.”

— Shane Nelson