Brian Casey (Atlanta), Richard Reibstein and Christopher Fontenelli (both of New York) obtained a dismissal of a $3.5 million wage claim against a Florida insurance company. The wage claim was the centerpiece of a lawsuit filed in New York by a Florida resident who alleged the company and its two principal officers misclassified him as an independent contractor and violated federal, New York and Florida wage laws by failing to pay him commissions and bonuses, breached its oral contract with him and violated the New York independent contractor salesperson law. The Locke Lord team filed a motion to dismiss all counts of the lawsuit and, in the alternative, to dismiss on the basis that New York was an inconvenient venue and that the most convenient forum was Florida. The court in New York granted the motion, dismissing the lawsuit for lack of a convenient forum, and entered judgment in favor of the client.
Posted on July 21, 2020