About Us - Julia McGuiness
McGuinness & Associates lawyers practice law throughout the state of California and nationally. Our firm lawyers are:
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PRACTICE AREAS
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Employment
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Class Action & PAGA
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Construction
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General Business Litigation
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Claims of Negligence
PROFFESIONAL ASSOCIATIONS
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Beverly Hills Bar Association
ADMISSIONS
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State Bar of California
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U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California
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U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California
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U.S. District Court for the Central District of California
EDUCATION
J.D., Southwestern Law School, Deans Merit Award, A selected member of Southwestern’s Trial Advocacy Honors Program, engaging in competitive multi-school trial tournaments, Witkin Award for Academic Excellence Recipient
B.S., English and Political Science ( Double Major ), University of California, Davis
SPEAKING ENGAGEMENTS
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"Employer Practice and Policies - The Basics," seminar presented to a client group.
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"Navigating the PAGA Terrain," seminar presented to a client group.
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"Employment Termination - Now What," seminar presented to a client group.
REPRESENTATIVE CLIENT EXPERIENCE
Ms. McGuinness has extensive experience in all phases of litigation, including pleading, pre-trial discovery, depositions, motion practice, mediation, and trial practice, in both state and federal court. Ms. McGuinness also has experience litigating in other state jurisdictions, as a pro hac vice litigant.
Ms. McGuinness’s primary areas of practice include labor & employment law (including wage and hour, retaliation and discrimination), civil and business litigation, construction, breach of contract, tort law and entertainment related litigation. Ms. McGuinness has represented Fortune 500 companies both prosecuting and defending against major construction defect claims and cross-claims.
Prior to working at McGuinness & Associates, Ms. McGuinness practiced at a plaintiffs’ class action firm in Los Angeles, where she represented plaintiff employees individually, and through class actions and representative Private Attorney General Act (“PAGA”) actions, who had been deprived of wages, and meal and rest periods. Ms. McGuinness has also represented plaintiffs and aggrieved employees who were not paid earned commissions, and who were fraudulently deprived of their equity value.
Ms. McGuinness has defended employers in discrimination, harassment, wrongful termination, retaliation, and wage and hour actions under the FLSA and state laws. She also has a great deal of experience representing plaintiff employees who have suffered from labor code violations including unpaid commissions, overtime and vacation pay; breach of contract; negligence; fraud; unlawful business practices; breach of fiduciary duty; and other labor code violations.
Ms. McGuinness also provides subject-matter counseling to manage workplace challenges covering the entire range of labor and employment issues, such as: hiring; workforce reductions; wage and hour exempt status; union issues; drug testing; independent contractor and pay practices audits; anti-harassment policies; and other employment practices training. This work includes advising national companies on different state laws and requirements.
Ms. McGuinness has had extensive deposition experience and training through the National Institute for Trial Advocacy (“NITA”). In law school, Ms. McGuinness externed with Ticketmaster L.L.C. working on licensing and merchandising agreements for Fortunate 100 companies, and with Fox Broadcasting Company in the Business & Legal Affairs department, working on international licensing, distribution and acquisition agreements for television and digital media.
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Successfully defended an unemployment claim and a sexual harassment and discrimination claim brought by an employee whose job was eliminated in a company restructuring event. The employee possessed substantial evidence of demeaning and discriminatory sexual preference comments texted about him among supervisors. Our firm was able to demonstrate that his termination was, however, entirely unrelated to the work place bias.
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A client hired a new manager from a competitor company. The new manager had signed a non-solicitation clause at his former employment. This clause covered the non-solicitation of both customers and employees of the former employer. The new manager, a member of the client’s management team, violated this agreement by soliciting and hiring several of the former employer’s employees. Former employer sued manager and client alleging they had conspired to illegally solicit members of his work force. At trial, our firm defeated the former employer’s claims, persuading the court that such a contractual anti-solicitation provision violated both California law and public policy, and could not be enforced.
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Former employee alleged a right to unemployment benefits and damages, asserting that he had been injured at work and terminated because of the work place injury. Our firm developed evidence that this former employee: (1) had been fully compensated for the same work injury at a prior time, (2) had not worked for the client for years after the actual injury occurred, and (3) had fabricated evidence in an effort to establish later injury and termination dates.
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Prevailed at a bench trial on a breach of oral contract claim, after the court determined that a written contract between the parties was invalid. Firm lawyers persuaded the court that sufficient evidence of an oral agreement existed, even though the written contract could not be enforced.
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Obtained multimillion-dollar settlement on breach of oral contract claim. Defendant contended that no contract had ever been formed and the claim was entirely fabricated. A videotaped deposition of defendant became dispositive evidence in favor of our client. The defendant’s testimony was inconsistent and generally lacked credibility as compared to other witness accounts.
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Successfully obtained hundred of thousands of dollars for client against Mortuary and Donor Organization for negligence and mishandling of corpse and infliction of emotional distress.
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Successfully defended several separate actions for the allegedly defective installation of life/fire/safety system equipment.
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Obtained a million dollar settlement for client employee against former employer based on claims for failure to pay earned wages, unlawful business practices, conversion and fraud. Our firm developed evidence that the employee’s former employer had wrongfully labeled employee’s commissions as a “bonus” to withhold payment, and further, had wrongfully undervalued and fraudulently concealed the true value of employee’s ownership interest in the company, to deprive the employee of the full value. Successfully defended employee against the former employer’s cross-claims for misappropriation of trade secrets, fraud and negligent misrepresentation.
