News & Media

$2.5M to Healthcare Workers in CHI Medical Group Wage and Hour Case
“This case should send a loud and clear message to the healthcare industry. Wage theft is illegal and hurts healthcare workers and the community they serve.”
– Scott Blankenship

Nearly $9M awarded to former Gig Harbor physicians who were fired after complaining about impaired doctor
Two physicians will receive more than $8.78 million in a yearslong wrongful termination lawsuit against Catholic Health Initiatives (CHI), which fired them in 2013 for blowing the whistle on patient harm, according to a class arbitration ruling.
– Seattle Times

The Worker’s Warrior: Scott Blankenship wants employment cases that are bigger than one lawsuit
Scott Blankenship runs a small firm known for getting big results for employees in high-profile employment discrimination cases. He sees each case as an opportunity to do more than get justice for one client.
– Super Lawyers

Suit claims Bulletproof Coffee company terminated executive after ‘brain mapping’ session
A former executive at Bulletproof 360, maker of the brain-boosting Bulletproof Coffee, accused the company of age discrimination in a new lawsuit and of terminating her due to health information she disclosed during “brain training” and “brain mapping” sessions.
– Geek Wirke

Seattle Public Schools agrees to pay former employee $500,000 after allegations of hostile work environment
Seattle Public Schools will pay a former employee and her attorneys $500,000 after she complained that she faced a work environment so hostile she was forced to quit the district’s athletic department in 2016.
– Seattle Times

Roof, Gutter Cleaners Get OK For $1.7M Wage Settlement
A Washington state judge on Friday gave his final
approval to a $1.7 million deal to end a class action accusing a company that performs window and gutter cleaning of not paying technicians for certain work they did off the clock.
– Law360

Hispanic man wins $1.85 million judgment over racial abuse on fishing boat
Attorneys for a Hispanic man who worked on an Alaska fishing boat say he has won a $1.85 million settlement against his former employer, Seattle-based Alaska Longline, after he was subjected to relentless racial harassment.
– Q13 Fox

Fry's to pay $2.3M sexual harassment settlement
Federal officials say electronics retailer Fry’s will pay a $2.3 million settlement after the retaliatory firing of a supervisor who alerted the company’s legal department that one of his employees was being sexually harassed.
– Associated Press

North Seattle nursing home to pay $475,000 in assault case
A Seattle nursing home will pay $475,000 to settle a lawsuit filed on behalf of an 86-year-old woman who was sexually assaulted by another resident.
– Seattle Times

Ex-policewoman awarded $225,000 to settle lawsuit
The city of Seattle has agreed to pay a former Seattle policewoman $225,000 to settle a federal lawsuit alleging that her supervisor and two fellow officers sexually harassed her and that department leaders tried to force her out of the ranks for reporting it.
– Seattle Times

Suit To Put Police On Trial -- Officer Says He Was Urged To Lie About Teen's 1996 Beating
Officer Paul Vang is, according to his chief, an exemplary policeman and a leader in his community in Appleton, Wis.
“I wish I had 50 just like him,” says Appleton Chief Rick Meyer. “He’s had a tremendous impact on this department and in this community.”
Vang has had an impact on the Seattle Police Department as well, but in an entirely different way. He sued two years ago, accusing the department of widespread racism and discrimination and claiming he was pressured to lie in an internal investigation into the alleged police beating of a black teenager in 1996.
– Seattle Times