Update: Mass. Lawyers Weekly Highlights Ellen Messing’s and Dahlia Rudavsky’s Latest Victories
‘Verdrager’ seen as game-changer by plaintiffs’ bar
In March MRW Online posted about Messing, Rudavsky & Weliky partner Ellen Messing’s Amicus Brief filed with the Massachusetts Employment Lawyer’s Association supporting Kamee Verdrager in her gender discrimination case against Mintz, Levin, Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky and Popeo PC. Recently decided in favor of Verdrager, a fantastic precedent has been set for plaintiffs in state employment law cases. Ellen spoke to Mass Lawyers Weekly about the impact of such a decision: “It’s almost a blueprint of all the ways in which discrimination can be shown – how different events over a long period of time can be viewed together and make up a case for pretext.”
Northeastern prof ‘made whole’ by arbitrator
Mass Lawyers Weekly also highlighted the work of another MRW partner, Dahlia Rudavsky, as she successfully fought to have the majority of Arbitrator Mark Irving’s resolution upheld in Professor Pegaret Pichler’s tenure-track dispute against Northeastern University. According to Attorney Rudavsky: “The arbitrator wasn’t saying whether the dean was right or wrong, he was just answering the question [of whether Pichler was held to a higher standard] yes or no, and if yes, was that fair?” Judge Heidi Brieger agreed with Attorney Rudavsky’s arguments and found that the arbitrator “did not exceed his authority by substituting his judgment for [the school’s dean] in reinstating Pichler.”