Norman Pine

The past year was a good one for Pine, who has long been one of the top appellate attorneys handling employment matters on behalf of employees.

He and his firm brought in seven major victories over the year, all of them involving high stakes both financially and for the lives of the individual plaintiffs and others, he said.

In one of the biggest wins, his firm safeguarded a $2.9 million jury award — and a $7.8 million fee award, including a 2.0 multiplier — for a state university safety inspector retaliated against for reporting asbestos and lead paint concerns to authorities. Sargent v. Board of Trustees of California State University, 2021 DJDAR 2150 (Cal. App. 1st Dist., filed March 5, 2021).

The appellate court held for the first time that private individuals can sue public entities under California’s Private Attorneys General Act. “So as of now, all governmental agencies know that if they retaliate against people, if they cover up safety problems, if they cover up discrimination or harassment, they have to face the potential for PAGA lawsuits,” Pine said.

His most significant win came not for an aggrieved employee, but for the family of a Black man killed by police. In August, the state Supreme Court held that the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department was 100% responsible for an $8 million award of noneconomic damages, even though the jury found sheriff deputies were only 60% responsible for the death. Because one deputy acted intentionally, damages should not be apportioned, the justices ruled. B.B. v. County of Los Angeles, S250734 (Ca. S. Ct., op. filed Aug. 10, 2020).

The man died after the deputies kneeled on his back and neck. The arguments at the high court came about a week after the George Floyd video surfaced. Both the majority opinion and a very strongly worded concurrence by Justice Goodwin H. Liu noted that fact.

Pine said 50 years from now, it will be the concurrence’s calling out of racism in the legal system that will be cited most.

Race issues are very common in employment litigation, he added. “The points [Liu] made about systemic racism, about juror bias, about the courts themselves having been tools of perpetuating these problems apply with full force in the employment area.”

Pine said a “passion area” for him is attorney fee awards in employment and tort cases. Litigating with the fees dependent entirely on winning is risky for lawyers, he said, adding that to make that point, he typically lists seven or eight big cases he lost when he submits fee applications.

“That’s the problem with these cases,” he said. “If lawyers won’t take them, the whole legislative scheme comes undone.”

— Don DeBenedictis