Rebecca B. Peterson-Fisher


Katz Banks Kumin • San Francisco


Rebecca B. Peterson-Fisher litigates individual cases and class actions involving discrimination and wage and hour violations, with a focus on cases that advance social justice. Previously, she was an attorney with a Los Angeles civil rights law firm, a senior staff attorney with Equal Rights Advocates, and a trial attorney with the Brooklyn Family Defense Project (now Brooklyn Defender Services). 


In late 2023, she and law partner Jenifer Liu merged their firm, Liu Peterson-Fisher LLP, with Katz Banks Kumin LLP, a 25-attorney employment, whistleblower and civil rights boutique, to form a new San Francisco office.


Peterson-Fisher and Liu met when Peterson-Fisher was a senior staff attorney at Equal Rights Advocates, a gender justice nonprofit. "KBK was interested in expanding into California by finding attorneys who were already part of the plaintiff attorney community who share their values and goals," Peterson-Fisher said. "Like us, they want to use their work to advance social justice."


She serves as co-lead counsel alongside Altshuler Berzon LLP and the National Women's Law Center in a groundbreaking national class action challenging a major insurance carrier's infertility policy for denying equal access to LGBTQ couples in violation of the Affordable Care Act. Berton v. Aetna Inc. et al., 5:23-cv-01849 (N.D. Cal., filed April 17, 2023).


Under the policy, heterosexual members seeking to get pregnant are deemed eligible for fertility treatment if they simply state that no pregnancy has resulted from intercourse over a period of months. However, LGBTQ members must submit proof that they have self-funded six or 12 cycles of expensive artificial insemination treatments -- the very treatments for which they are seeking coverage -- to establish eligibility.


"In February, Aetna's motion to dismiss was denied, and Judge [Haywood S.] Gilliam found their policy facially discriminatory," Peterson-Fisher said. "We're now in discovery and we'll be moving for class certification later this year."


And Peterson-Fisher is co-lead with Pardell, Kurzyk & Girablado PLLC in a statewide Private Attorneys General Act case over the alleged misclassification of operations managers at a fast-food chain and the failure to pay them overtime. Robertson et al. v. Raising Cane's, CVR112306468 (Riverside Co. Super. Ct., filed Dec. 1, 2023).


The case is currently stalled as Peterson-Fisher and colleagues oppose a defense motion to stay the matter pending an arbitration of claims by the lead plaintiff. "They're basing the stay request on dicta from the Adolph v. Uber decision," she said, referring to the state Supreme Court's 2023 holding on PAGA standing issues.


"We see this as a trending tactic to delay PAGA cases to disadvantage plaintiffs," Peterson-Fisher said. "It's an unsettled issue, and we hope to settle it."