April 2007
WIN AT WORK MONTHLY
A Community Service of SESSIONS & KIMBALL LLP, Employee Rights Attorneys
Win at Work	Employee Rights Update
CHOOSING LAWS WISELY In pursuing claims for employee rights you have the ability to use appropriate laws that will help you the most. For any workplace wrong, many different overlapping laws may apply. Some may be better than others in terms of deadlines, damages, penalties, selection of courts, jurisdiction over potential defendants, and procedure. For example, some federal laws prohibit discrimination and only apply to employers of 15 or more employees, while its California counterpart applies if there are just 5 employees. A breach of contract claim may be easier to prove than a “tort” claim for discrimination but does not include “punitive” or punishment damages. A deadline for pursuing a negligence claim in another state may be years longer than it is in California. Recoveries in certain courts with liberal judges or juries may be twice as high as in more conservative areas. Every important aspect of a claim must first be evaluated in terms of laws that will affect the outcome before litigation. Some aspects may be sacrificed to stress other, more important, ones. If you don’t strategize with all your resources, you will unnecessarily limit the value of your claim.	MORE CASH FOR BREAKS In one of the most important Employment Law cases of the year, the California Supreme Court in Murphy v. Kenneth Cole Productions handed down a landmark ruling in what many legal experts say is the hottest plaintiff’s employment law case of the year. Revisiting the ground rules governing lawsuits over missed break periods, the Court ruled that the “additional hour of pay” due employees who work through meal and rest periods constitutes a wage and not a penalty according to “[Labor Code] section 226.7’s plain language, the administrative and legislative history, and the compensatory purpose of the remedy.” The result of this is instead of the one-year statute of limitations governing penalty claims, employees seeking back pay for missed meal and rest periods are now entitled to a three-year statute of limitations. This ruling triples the time period for employees to go back and recover such wages, and triggers potential employer liability for late payment. Paul B. Miner, Attorney
Update on our attorneys: Heidi Hutchinson has won two important court rulings in federal and state courts.
Look for our answers to employees’ questions in the “Life and Work Q & A” column of the Orange County Register’s "Business Monday" magazine. E-mail us at info@job-law.com to have your address added or removed from our monthly mailing list. For more employee rights information or for past issues of Win at Work Monthly, click here for our website, job-law.com; here to order our book, Employee Rights in California; or contact our office directly at 23456 Madero, Suite 170, Mission Viejo, CA 92691, (949) 380-0900, (800) 774-7494, info@job-law.com. The Win at Work portion of Win at Work Monthly is from our ongoing syndicated column, which appears in the Los Angeles Times’ “Career Builder Magazine” and elsewhere. Win at Work Monthly is intended for general information and should not be construed as legal advice or opinion. Readers in need of legal advice should promptly retain the services of an attorney. ©2007 by Sessions & Kimball LLP