Alleged Wrongful Termination in Violation of USERRA

Represented a national auto parts and service chain in a nationally publicized case of alleged wrongful termination in violation of the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act (USERRA) by a naval reservist. This federal court lawsuit was the subject of inflammatory media publicity on CNN's MoneyLine and other major media outlets. We minimized the dispute by successfully compelling the federal action into private mediation after extensive briefing in which we convinced the Arizona district court not to follow California law precedent declining to enforce similar arbitration agreements. Compelling the action into private arbitration significantly reduced the value of the USERRA discrimination claims and positioned the case for an early and favorable settlement without adversarial arbitration proceedings.