Norman H. Pine

Pine, who opened his appellate law practice Pine Tillett Pine in 1994, devotes most of his efforts to employment law cases. "Employment is so important and so personal to people," he explained. "One's identity is wrapped up in one's work. Economic harm often does not nearly cover the damage one suffers in these cases. The emotional distress is often even greater. Helping in such cases is very satisfying."

When a state jury awarded two whistleblowers $1.6 million for suffering retaliation after they disclosed that an El Cajon-based plasma laboratory ignored safety regulations, Pine defended the verdict before the 4th District Court of Appeal. The jurors found the two were retaliated against for making the disclosures to the U.S Food and Drug Administration.

The lab collected disease-state plasma from HIV-positive donors who believed it would be used in the search for a cure. The whistleblowers found that the plasma was being sent to another location where a "research use only" label was removed and replaced with "research or manufacturer use." Scantibodies did not have the proper license to collect disease-state plasma.

The jury found the lab committed fraud with malice and awarded punitive damages. The appellate panel affirmed the judgment in full, holding that the trial court had properly instructed the jury that whistleblower protection is not limited to the first employee to disclose, that the trial court had properly handled deliberations involving abstaining and alternate jurors, and that the plaintiffs had adequately established their retaliation claims. Scantibodies Laboratory Inc. v. Nolasco, D071923 (4th DCA, opinion filed Feb. 26, 2019).

Pine, who briefed the appeal, noted that punitives are rarely awarded. "The jury and the court sees the need for public shaming and punishment," he said. "Punitive damages are the hardest to get through the appellate process, because courts are very strict in allowing such damages to be imposed."

Pine stepped beyond the employment law context when he argued a wrongful death matter June 2 before the state Supreme Court. The topic seemed ripped from the headlines as the nation was roiled by fallout from the police killing of George Floyd a week earlier in Minneapolis: the decedent in Pine's case had been pinned down, like Floyd, by law enforcement officers. One of them pressed his right knee at length on the man's head near the neck; he died in a hospital. The question for the court concerned an issue of the deputies' comparative fault. But "it was an eerily similar circumstance [to that of Floyd], and the justices noted it," Pine said. B.B. v. County of Los Angeles, S250734 (Ca. S. Ct., petition for review filed Aug. 20, 2018).

-- John Roemer