Shegerian & Associates, a Santa Monica-based law firm specializing in employee rights, had two of its cases featured last week as “Champion Verdicts” of the year at the California Employment Lawyers Association (CELA) 22nd annual Employment Law Conference in Oakland, California.

The presentation, to an audience of California’s leading labor and employment attorneys and advocates, focused on the largest and most impressive trial verdicts of the last twelve months and spotlighted two unrelated cases tried to victory by Shegerian & Associates.

One of the cases singled out by CELA was Modrovich v. Sports Club LA. The Shegerian & Associates client, Elise Modrovich, a Pilates instructor, was wrongfully terminated in violation of Public Policy because she had complained about unpaid overtime wages. Modrovich sued Sports Club LA for wrongful termination, retaliation, violation of public policy, and intentional infliction of emotional distress, among other claims. The case resulted in a Jury Verdict of $1,345,293 plus punitive damages.

The other case celebrated by CELA as a “Champion Verdict” was Sun v. Toyota Motor Sales, a pregnancy discrimination case. The Shegerian & Associates client had attempted to return to work after her maternity leave, and was instead terminated shortly after her leave had ended. This past March the case resulted with a jury verdict against Toyota Motor Sales, Inc. for $2,812,000, including $812,000 in compensatory damages and $2,000,000 in punitive damages.

“It’s a great honor for our work to be recognized by CELA as the most impressive of the year,” said Carney Shegerian, founder of Shegerian & Associates. “At the end of the day, we as California attorneys must continue our efforts to protect the workers of our state from discrimination, wrongful termination and other abuses and preserve fairness and equality in the workplace.”