Firm News
Oct 20, 2010
Seyfarth Shaw Adds Litigation Attorney Rebecca S. Bjork to Labor & Employment Department in Washington D.C.
Contact:
Kevin Livingston, National Director of Public Relations
(212) 218-5272, klivingston@seyfarth.com
Brings focus on products liability, consumer, and employment class actions in pharmaceutical, transportation, and hospitality industries
WASHINGTON D.C. (October 20, 2010) – Leading full-service law firm Seyfarth Shaw LLP announced that litigation attorney Rebecca Bjork has joined the firm’s Washington D.C. office as of counsel. She will be part of the firm’s Labor & Employment Department.
Bjork joins Seyfarth from O’Melveny & Meyers LLP, where she was counsel with the firm’s Class Action, Mass Torts and Insurance Litigation practice. She has represented companies in product, consumer, and employment class action and single-plaintiff litigation in the pharmaceutical, technology, transportation, and hospitality industries.
Bjork has particular experience in proceedings before the Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation (MDL), which she has petitioned to establish proceedings and to appoint specific federal courts to oversee them. Her work on MDL proceedings includes transferring newly-filed state court cases to the federal courts through removal and remand opposition briefing, and managing pre-trial activities in the transferee court. Bjork has advised on numerous MDL cases, including multiple pharmaceutical class actions, an employee classification case, and consumer class actions against an automobile manufacturer, among others.
“Rebecca Bjork’s experience on complex matters, in particular multidistrict litigation proceedings and defending against class action lawsuits, makes her an immediate asset for our labor & employment group’s litigation matters,” said Lisa Damon, chair of Seyfarth Shaw’s Labor & Employment department. “She strengthens our employment class action litigation capabilities in Washington and nationally.”
On the regulatory front, Bjork has advised companies on compliance issues in the postsecondary education and telecommunications sectors as well as on political campaign contributions. She also has managed comprehensive discovery programs in several class action cases.
Prior to her legal career, Bjork was an associate professor in the Communication Department at the University of Utah, where she also served as director of the university’s debate team. Following law school, she joined the D.C. office of Dow Lohnes PLLC in the firm’s Communication and Education practice groups.
“Rebecca’s broad professional background and legal experience make her an outstanding lawyer. We are happy to welcome someone with such strong credentials to the Washington D.C. office,” said Joseph R. Damato, managing partner of Seyfarth Shaw’s Washington D.C. office.
Bjork received a bachelors degree from the University of Minnesota, a masters degree from University of North Texas, a doctorate from the Annenberg School of Communications at the University of Southern California, and her law degree from Georgetown University Law Center. She is admitted to the Maryland and District of Columbia bars.
Seyfarth’s Labor & Employment department has more than 350 lawyers representing public and private companies, ranging from the largest Fortune 100 companies to the smallest start-ups, as well as not-for-profit organizations of all sizes. Seyfarth’s approach is distinguished by a focus on in-depth knowledge within the broad field of employment law and litigation. The firm’s employment attorneys are organized to leverage their comprehension of key workplace subspecialties, such as employment class actions, wage and hour issues, employee benefits lawsuits, workplace safety matters, and labor-management relations disputes, among other matters. They are also organized by industry groups to develop a thorough understanding of their clients’ needs, which allows the attorneys to be best positioned to deliver superior results.
Seyfarth Shaw has over 750 attorneys located in 10 offices throughout the United States, including: Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles, New York, Sacramento, San Francisco, and Washington D.C., as well as Brussels, Belgium. Seyfarth Shaw provides a broad range of legal services in the areas of labor and employment, employee benefits, litigation, corporate, and real estate. The firm’s practice reflects virtually every industry and segment of the country’s business and social fabric. Clients include over 300 of the Fortune 500 companies, financial institutions, newspapers and other media, hotels, health care organizations, airlines and railroads. The firm also represents a number of federal, state and local governmental and educational entities. For more information, please visit www.seyfarth.com.