Debra L. Fischer

Although she has wide experience in all areas of employment law, Fischer has concentrated almost exclusively on employee mobility matters for the last decade, representing employers on both sides of the issue at different times.

“On one side, we help companies protect against theft of trade secrets and confidential information,” she said. “And on the other side, we help companies hire employees and fight against sometimes illegal or unenforceable restrictive covenants that the former employers attempt to impose on them.”

“I love it,” she added. “The issues are time-sensitive, the stakes are high. … It’s satisfying helping [clients] with their most important resource, their employees.”

In November, Fischer and the six other lawyers on her team secured the right of longtime client Alliant Insurance Services Inc. to hire employees from a competitor by showing that the competitors’ restrictive covenants against solicitation of clients were unenforceable under California law.

“That’s consistent with California law, but it’s always important and significant when a court reinforces that,” she said. Gallagher v. Tarantino, 3:20-cv-05505 (N.D. Calif., filed Aug. 7, 2020).

They also blocked an injunction in a similar case in Texas state court. Gallagher v. Pierce, 471-03886-2020 (Collin Co., TX, Dist. Ct., filed Aug. 13, 2020).

Although she and her team are based in Los Angeles, they work with as many as 30 other Morgan Lewis attorneys to take on matters across the country. As an example, they recently won a ruling from an Illinois judge that a noncompetition provision in an employment contract was overly broad and unenforceable under Massachusetts law, meaning an insurance executive from Massachusetts could continue at his new post with an Illinois competitor. RSC Insurance Brokerage Inc. v Largay, 1:20-cv-03939 (N.D. Ill., filed Jul. 6, 2020). Fischer noted that California has particularly strong laws against non-compete provisions in employment contracts. Other states have recently passed similar laws, she said, but still other states are considering or adding new laws to encourage the clauses.

“It’s important to be knowledgeable about the various states’ laws because an employee may be under an agreement under one state’s law, but it gets litigated in another state,” she said.

In another area, Fischer was part of a Morgan Lewis pro bono team that obtained a settlement for four teenagers attacked by police in Delano, Calif. The team won an award from the ACLU of Southern California for the work.

During the pandemic, Fischer developed and led a series of presentations on client development for women lawyers in the firm’s labor and employment practice. She also led regular well-being presentations and virtual gatherings for anyone in the firm, based on knowledge she gained studying to become a third-degree black-belt in Taekwondo.

— Don DeBenedictis