Biography
Barbara A. Reeves, Esq., CEDS (Certified E-Discovery Specialist) is highly regarded as a successful employment mediator by counsel for employees and employers.
Ms. Reeves has mediated and settled countless employment disputes with issues involving discrimination for protected classes, wage and hour claims, sexual harassment, wrongful termination, Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA) and California Family Rights Act (CFRA). She has also handled a wide range of arbitrations and is viewed as fair and efficient in guiding disputes towards resolution.
Ms. Reeves understands the importance of being treated with respect and dignity in the workplace, and the emotional impact of discrimination and termination, and she communicates well with all parties. She provides objective evaluations of the legal and factual strengths and weaknesses of each case in order to assist parties in resolving their disputes in an economic and rational manner. She is an evaluative mediator who will discuss candidly and thoughtfully the strengths and weaknesses of the case with each party and his or her counsel.
Representative Matters
- Class Action
- Successfully mediated dozens of wage and hour class actions, with class sizes ranging from 90 to 10,000 class members
- Representative matters include:
- Meal and rest breaks
- Overtime, including work performed off-the-clock
- Minimum wage violations
- Claims for reimbursement of mileage, tools, uniforms, and other expenses
- Claims that class members were misclassified as exempt
- Claims that class members were misclassified as independent contractors
- Wage and hour/off the clock "security screening" class action
- Claims brought under Private Attorney General Act of 2004 (PAGA)
- Mediated and consolidated class action involving wage and hour dispute against financial institution that had been brought as 250 individual arbitrations after the class certification was denied
- Discrimination
- Successfully resolved numerous disability discrimination claims involving failure to provide reasonable accommodation and discrimination for a variety of disabilities, both physical and mental
- Arbitrated class action involving racial discrimination against aerospace company
- Mediated race discrimination class action involving an insurance business
- Arbitrated disability discrimination claims involving failure to provide reasonable accommodation and discrimination
- Successfully mediated matters involving workers claiming national origin, age discrimination, race discrimination, and retaliation, often utilizing creative solutions providing desirable benefits for employees
- Arbitrated matters involving national origin and race discrimination claims and retaliation
- Mediated race discrimination class action involving an insurance company
- Successfully resolved numerous cases with males and females claiming sexual orientation discrimination and retaliation at workplace
- Arbitrated matters involving allegations of sexual discrimination
- Resolved gender bias claims with issues involving disparate treatment of multiple plaintiffs, unequal pay, and glass ceiling issues
- ERISA
- Arbitrated dispute involving medical payments for mental health facility
- Mediated class action against large employer and two plans involving continuation medical coverage under COBRA
- Mediated class action involving balance billing
- Mediated several disability and retirement benefit claims
- Harassment
- Successfully resolved claims of sexual harassment and discrimination involving supervisors and subordinates and co-workers; issues included constructive discharge due to management harassment, claims of favoritism and conflicts of interest because of sexual harassment, same sex sexual harassment, assault, and bullying in the workplace
- Wage and Hour
- Mediated wage and hour disputes against several Southern California companies
- Mediated and served as discovery referee in class action wage and hour cases
- Arbitrated wage and hour class action concerning on-duty meal periods
- Wrongful Discharge
- Matters involving wrongful discharge in violation of public policy
- Wrongful termination claims involving allegations of health and safety issues, accounting fraud, wage and hour violations, violations of business and professions code
Completed Virtual ADR training conducted by the JAMS Institute, the training arm of JAMS.
- Honors and Memberships
- Fellow, Chartered Institute of Arbitrators
- Fellow and current Board Member and Officer, College of Commercial Arbitrators
- Fellow, Academy of Court Appointed Masters
- Arbitrator, Court of Arbitration for Sport
- Board Member, California International Arbitration Council
- Former President, Association of Business Trial Lawyers (Los Angeles Chapter)
- Former board member or chair: Antitrust Sections of the State Bar of California and Los Angeles County Bar Association; ADR Committee, LACBA; Trustee, LACBA, Women Lawyers of Los Angeles
- Current and/or former board member of numerous public interest organizations, including Public Counsel, Western Center on Law and Poverty, and a Founder of the Alliance for Children’s Rights
- Member, California State Bar and the Bar of the District of Columbia
- Certified E-Discovery Specialist
- Chambers National Mediator List - 2016-2021
- Recognized, Silicon Valley Arbitration & Mediation Center (SVAMC)'s 2021 List of the World's Leading Technology Neutrals
- National Law Journal ADR Champion - 2017
- Recent Publications and Speaking Engagements
- Speaker at the Emerging Issues Conference of the ABA Health Law Section (2016-2019); California Society of Health Attorneys Annual Meeting (2016, 2017); ABA Insurance Coverage Litigation Committee Conference (2017-2019)
- “A Special Master’s Role in Hospital Merger Cases,” LAW360 (2016)
- "Whose Arbitration is This, Anyway?", JAMS Global Engineering and Construction Newsletter, Fall 2013
- Author, Updates to Rutter Group Employment Law Treatise, ADR chapter, 2012-2016
- "Litigation Solutions: Referees and Special Masters," Daily Journal, June 13, 2012
- "It’s Time to Fix Arbitration Discovery," Los Angeles Lawyer, January 2010
- "Ordered to arbitration? Take advantage!" Advocate Magazine, CAALA, September 2010
- “Uprooting the Decision Tree,” Advocate Magazine, CAALA, September 2018
- “How Third-Party Funders change the Chemistry of Settlements,” Advocate Magazine, CAALA, September 2017
- "As the Economy Stumbles, Employment Discrimination Claims Climb," Employment Law Strategist, Law Journal Newsletters, December 2008
- Author or co-author of leading articles of ADR, international and domestic commercial arbitration and mediation, and managing costs in ADR; frequent trainer and lecturer on arbitration, mediation and e-discovery
- ADR Profiles
- "People Person," Daily Journal, ADR Profile, March 2, 2018
- "Well Rounded," Daily Journal, ADR PRofile, March 26, 2010
- JAMS, 2006-Present
- Associate General Counsel and Vice President, Southern California Edison and Edison International, 1999-2005
- Partner at major international law firms (Paul Hastings; Fried Frank; Morrison & Foerster), 1981-1999
- United States Department of Justice, Antitrust Division: various positions including Chief of the Los Angeles office, Trial Attorney, and Special Assistant to the Assistant Attorney General
- Law Clerk to Judge Alfred T. Goodwin, United States Court of Appeal for the Ninth Circuit
- J.D., cum laude, Harvard Law School
Counsel Comments
- Recognized as "an excellent mediator and a great listener."
- Chambers USA, 2021 - Recognized as "very capable and very responsible."
- Chambers USA, 2016 - “The breadth of her experience prior to becoming a mediator gives her a sense of how clients react to things.”
- Prominent Attorney - “You walk in and right away, you know she’s ready to roll up her sleeves and get into a case with you.”
- Prominent Attorney - “She understood and tackled [the issues] quickly. She was very efficient.”
- Prominent Attorney - “Thank you for your dilligent work and follow up on this case. Your continued dedication and effors went well above and beyond of what we typically receive from a mediator.”
- Prominent Attorney
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Practice Areas
- Antitrust
- Arbitration
- Business/Commercial
- Cybersecurity & Privacy
- Employment
- Entertainment and Sports
- Health Care
- Higher Education & Title IX
- Insurance
- Intellectual Property
- International & Cross-Border
- Life Sciences
- Real Property
- Special Master/Discovery Referee
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