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Ganz & Gorsline

   

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Los Angeles Daily Journal
November 7, 1997

VERDICTS & SETTLEMENTS
Fired Whistle-blower Obtains $4.5M

Today's issue of Verdicts and Settlements profiles Los Angeles litigators Laurie Susan Gorsline, left, and Philip J. Ganz of Ganz & Gorsline. Together, they obtained a $4.5 million verdict in a wrongful termination suit on behalf of a whistle-blower accountant who was fired after he informed his employer they were violating tax laws.

Name: Philip J. Ganz Jr.

Firm: Ganz & Gorsline, Los Angeles.

Background: Ganz was born in Chicago. He received his bachelor's degree from Michigan State University in 1970 and his law degree from the University of Michigan in 1973. After law school, Ganz joined the firm of Nossaman, Waters, Scott, Krueger & Riordan. In 1976, he joined the firm of Long & Levit, and in 1978, joined the firm of Stroock & Stroock & Lavan. Ganz ran his own firm from 1980 until 1985 when he joined the firm of Valensi, Rose & Magaram. In 1992, he became of counsel to the Law Offices of Hardy L. Thomas and established his own firm. In 1996, he and his partner, Laurie Susan Gorsline, formed Ganz & Gorsline. He has been practicing for 24 years, specializing primarily in employment law. His last six plaintiff's verdicts have exceeded $3 million each, on average. Ganz has three teenage daughters, Cory, Esmé and Maureen.

Do you think that one of the reasons that many employment law cases end up in trial is because many employers or supervisors do not know how to proceed once a complaint has been filed?
"I think what happens is that factors, other than the merits, get in the way of parties coming to a resolution. Egos get involved from the defense perspective. Sometimes in a whistle blower case or a discrimination case, it is particularly difficult when top management is involved in the illegal activities, because they have a difficult time seeing their own exposure, because they are trying to convince themselves what they did was right. It is not ordinary business people making decisions sometimes. It's the people whose conduct is in question who, by settling, are admitting essentially that they created a problem and their careers are now on the line. They don't want to do that. That's why sometimes cases get taken to court. Sometimes the defense gets too blinded by its own perspective to see real exposure."

When you are advising an employer, a company, do you advise having a neutral party come in as a mediator?
"I think it would be real useful for a company to have an outside mediator to come in to help resolve problems. I mean someone who is not tied in with human resources, because human resources often really is nothing other than another face of the company that's essentially 'toadying' up to management. They basically take on the same face of management and don't look at things from an objective perspective. That happens all too often."

In public policy terms, a whistle blower is looked on as an asset, and notwithstanding your successful verdict in the Case In Focus, blowing the whistle is often a terrible thing for the employee.
"It is terribly harmful for the employees. Most whistle blowers suffer miserably and find it difficult to find other employment. They are ostracized. They are vilified. They are defamed. The companies dig up all kinds of dirt trying to smear the employee, and it's very hard. It takes not only courage, but stamina and perseverance for an employee who is a whistle blower to prevail, and you really have to get the goods on the company and really have them essentially caught red-handed."

So do you advise your clients that, even though a company is guilty of wrongdoing, they must realize the consequences of whistle blowing before proceeding? Or is it after they have been terminated that you see them?
"We sometimes see clients who have just blown the whistle but have not yet been fired. They see the ax over their head, and sometimes we negotiate on behalf of those clients for a resolution, and sometimes it works pretty well. But yeah, we counsel clients who are whistle blowers to know that they face a rough and rocky road ahead."

In the Case In Focus, the plaintiff discovered the wrongdoing early on-right after getting hired and reported it quickly. Is that unusual?
"That's the first time I have seen a whistle blower who found it so quickly. That has to do with the nature of his job and the nature of their conduct. Given the nature of his job as controller, he would have been blind not to have seen it if he was doing his job. The surprising thing was no one else had stopped it, and no one else had the courage to stop it."

Is it the perception that whistle blowers often wait for something else to happen before they decide to blow the whistle?
"(Laugh) That's always a defense that management considers. They would like to posture it as, 'He or she was having problems anyway,' and they often try to work the gambit of 'It was only after he saw that he was on the way out that he blew the whistle out of spite and sour grapes.' So we have to contend with that stratagem."

The first trial ended in a hung jury. Why do you think that was?
"A number of things. Oddly enough to us, when we spoke to the jurors who voted against us in the first trial, a lot of them were saying to us 'Where was the evidence of this? Where was the evidence of that?' The evidence was in there, but they didn't see it in the first trial. In the second trial, what we did was we sort of blew that evidence up and magnified it so that nobody could miss it."

How did you go about doing that?
"Well, an emphasis on questions. We came up with a new illustrative exhibit. By asking questions in a dramatic matter, it was clear what the answer had to be, and it answered the questions that the reluctant jurors in the trial felt had not been answered properly. Also, we did a lot better job in jury selection I think, and we shortened our case. We shortened the presentation of evidence considerably and lengthened the closing argument so that it was extremely clear what the evidence was."

Was it an easy decision to retry the case after the hung jury?
"Well, (laugh) since it couldn't settle. After settlement talks failed after the first trial, we had no choice. This is the first time I have ever tried a case twice, and please don't take this the wrong way, but I thought it would be like kissing my sister. It turned out to be a much more exciting and dynamic trial than the first time."

Why is that?
"Well, because of the way we changed the presentation and because of some of the adjustments we made. The defense witnesses said even more outlandish things and the impeachment became even clearer as a result. That contributed greatly I think."

Do you think that the defense was a little comfortable in the second trial after the hung jury in the first?
"Well, let me first say that my opposing counsel is a tremendous lawyer. He is a terrific lawyer. ... I don't know what they did. I don't know if they did what we did which was listen to the people who voted against us and adjusted appropriately. I firmly believe that made a difference."

Workplace Attorney Works Both Sides of Law

Name: Laurie Susan Gorsline

Firm: Ganz & Gorsline, Los Angeles

Background: Gorsline was born in San Bernardino. She received her bachelor's degree from the University of California at Los Angeles in 1982 and her law degree from Loyola Law School in 1984. After law school, Gorsline was the research attorney for several Superior Court judges and was also the Supervising Staff Attorney for the Law Departments for the Los Angeles Superior Court. Afterward, she joined the firm of Valensi, Rose & Magaram. In 1993, she joined the Law Offices of Hardy L. Thomas and in 1996, she and Philip J. Ganz, Jr. formed the firm of Ganz & Gorsline. Gorsline has been practicing for 13 years and specializes in employment-related matters.

You represent both plaintiff's and defendants in employment-related matters. Can that be difficult or do you find it helpful?
"I don't find it difficult. I find it enhances it. It gives me the ability to be a better lawyer, because I can be more objective...You know, being able to see it from the other side."

When attorneys only litigate for one side do they sometimes become advocates?
"Well, my experience is that people who only litigate on one side... I just don't think they necessarily see the other side. Not everyone, but some. Seeing the other side helps you make better decisions, and it also helps you give better advice to your client."

That leads me to the next question. Is an essential part of your job advising clients how to proceed before a lawsuit is filed?
"Oh yeah. Definitely. I try to map out what their alternatives are, the various courses of action that they do have, the pros and cons of each course of action, and then I make recommendations to them as to what I think they should do."

In the Case In Focus, most of the damages award to the plaintiff were punitive damages. It seems that the jury did not believe the defendants.
"Yes, I guess not."

Did the defense, In some ways, make it easier for you?
"Well, they did in a lot of ways, because a lot of the things they testified to during the trial were impeached... we believed [the statements] were inconsistent with statements they made either in their deposition or in the previous trial. You know, we tried this case once before, and the jury hung. I also believe that certain statements just were not very...believable - like all the documents were destroyed in the earthquake (laugh)."

Oh, they tried to use that one?
"I mention that one because the jury mentioned that one to me when I spoke to one or more of them. Yeah, they understood there was an earthquake, but how can [the documents] be destroyed? So maybe they are jumbled up a bit. Maybe they might be a little wet, but [the documents] would still be there. I mean you wouldn't just trash them. That was something that one of the jurors had mentioned to me. Something they didn't believe.

So basically, the defense came in and said, 'The dog ate my homework'?
"Well, that's what the jury said. I don't want to get sued for defamation. You have to be careful."

That's understandable.
"But the jury did not buy that reason [the defendants] gave. The jury did not believe that [statement]. There were more statements like that which the jury did not believe. Actually, there was a really funny moment with one of the defendants' witnesses. She was a bookkeeper or something like that in the company. She got on the witness stand and basically said that my client made a mistake that caused her to have to re-input either 200 or 400 checks back into the system, and that this took her two whole weeks to do almost full time and she even needed to get help from other people. So then, my partner asked her on cross-examination, 'You say it took you all of this time. How many checks do you input per hour?' And she looked at him and said, 'Excuse me?' He said, 'How many checks can you input per hour?' And she looks at everyone , and I guess she didn't see the connection. She says, 'Oh fifty!', and she was very proud of it. So, of course, my partner says, 'Well, if you can input 50 an hour, even 400 checks would only take you eight hours. How do you explain that?' And she was like 'Oh I forgot!' and the whole jury just started laughing, because they obviously got that something was not computing."

She was a good witness for you.
"She was a great witness for us. I was so glad that they called her. She was wonderful!"

Considering all of this, why didn't this case settle? Were settlement discussions going on?
"Oh sure. We are always interested in resolving disputes. We make that very clear, unlike a lot of lawyers who view that as demonstrating weakness. My partner and I do not agree with that. We believe that it is our ethical obligation to try to resolve any disputes that can be resolved, and so we are usually the first to mention getting it resolved through settlement, mediation or some alternative dispute resolution method. More often than not, we are met with an unwilling defendant on the other side, not always, but a lot. I have seen in my practice that for the most part, that kind of attitude has pretty much backfired in every situation. I don't know why they didn't settle. They didn't want to, I guess (laugh). One thing I do find is if the party who is alleged to be the wrongdoer, let's say the harasser for example, is also the one making the decisions about settlement, it is much harder to resolve the case than it is with someone else making the decision. Then, they are able to make a business decision and be more objective about it. In this particular instance, it was a smaller company, and the same person who was alleged to be the one that had engaged in the retaliatory conduct was the person making the decisions. Maybe that had something to do with it, because you know, then it is personal.

Because at the same time they are agreeing to settle, it may look like they are admitting they were wrong.
"Exactly, and it's just more personal. Feelings get involved, and it becomes a lot messier and harder to get resolved."

How did you decide on the legal field?
"Well, you know, it is kind of strange, because when I was a little girl both my mom and dad had to work. Most of my friends' mothers stayed at home. I wanted my mother to stay home, but everyday she got up and got dressed. She looked so glamorous to me. She was a secretary and she would drive me to school. I just remember how much I admired her, and I wanted to be just like her. I wanted to go to work everyday, but I wanted to be the boss (laugh). I just really admired her, and I think that pushed me into the legal field."

What other litigation professionals say about this attorney: Attorney Linda Rottman of Valensi, Rose & Magaram in Century City calls Gorsline a "fantastic attorney. She is one of the best I have come across in my entire life. One of the things that is so great about her is she leaves absolutely no stone unturned. There is not a single detail of a case that escapes her which is really uncommon." Rottman adds: "She is also a wonderful person. She is very kind and very caring about the clients and very sincere." Attorney Randy A. Berg of Lavely & Singer in Century City describes Gorsline as "the hardest working, most professional attorney I think I know. She is fantastic. She is just a kind, loyal, devoted and thoughtful person. She thinks very clearly before she makes a move. ... She is just very thorough. I mean, I think I work long hours as an attorney, but she is quite, quite dedicated. She has pulled many all-nighters'." Attorney David Ferrante of Reback, Hulbert, McAndrews & Kjar in Manhattan Beach was Gorsline's opposing counsel and says: "I maintained on of the best relationships with [Gorsline] than I have with any other opposing counsel. She is a professional and a lady, and she maintained that throughout the lawsuit... She knows her law. She knows everything about her case, and she approaches it with a very diplomatic and professional manner. Ferrante adds: "To me it is always a real pleasure to learn about the law from your opposing counsel, and I don't often say that. She is someone I feel I took something from, and I appreciate that."

-Kathy Kinsey

Copyright 1997 Daily Journal Corp. Reprinted with Permission.

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