Richard A. Paul
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Rich Paul has been a fixture among California employment lawyers for over 35 years, as a practitioner and as a neutral, combining representation of flagship public and private institutions with service as a neutral educator, mediator, investigator and community member.
RATES:
- $550 per hour
- Half-day – $2,400: includes 4 hours plus 1 hour of preparation
- 3/4 day – $3,600: includes 6 hours plus 1.5 hours of preparation
- Full day – $4,800: includes 8 hours plus 2 hours of preparation
- Preparation includes a no-charge pre-mediation telephone conference
- $300 non-refundable administrative fee per party
LEGAL CAREER & PRIOR EXPERIENCE:
Rich joined the Gray Cary (now DLA) firm in 1973 and became a partner and Chair of that firm’s statewide Employment Law Group. Since 1996, he has served as Adjunct/Visiting Professor of Employment and Labor Law at the University of San Diego School of Law and has also lectured at other institutions. In 1998, Rich co-founded Paul, Plevin, Sullivan & Connaughton LLP to focus on public as well as private sector employment law issues, representing high tech, research, higher education, arts, and other community organizations and individuals. He has deep experience in whistleblowing, retaliation, discrimination, disability, pay equity, misclassification, breach of contract, labor, harassment, free speech, tenure, student and academic matters in both the private and public sector. He is an accomplished trial lawyer and a Master Barrister in the Enright Chapter of the American Inns of Court.
EDUCATION & PROFESSIONAL AFFILIATIONS:
Rich earned his B.A. with honors from Valparaiso University in 1970; in 2005 he was honored with the University’s Distinguished Alumni Award. Rich received his J.D. from Stanford Law School in 1973, where he was awarded the Hilmer Oehlmann prize.
Rich has been a frequent lecturer on California and national employment law panels for the National Association of College and University Attorneys, the National Employment Law Institute, and the Management and Labor Employment Roundtable, among other groups, and has been a prolific writer on employment law topics. He has served on a variety of Boards, including the Editorial Review Board for the California Employment Law Letters. He currently serves on the Board of Directors of the National Center for Conflict Resolution and is past Chairman of the Boards of The San Diego Blood Bank and Turning Point. In 2010, he was elected as a Fellow in the prestigious National College of Employment and Labor Lawyers and is an invited member of the American Employment Law Council.
ADR EXPERIENCE & SPECIALTIES:
During his career Rich has developed and taught negotiation and dispute resolution programs for the University of California and other professional groups; served as a mediator and arbitrator in various employment matters; taught and conducted independent investigations; been a certified Title IX hearing officer; served as a hearing officer in professional medical privilege matters; been instrumental in mediating and settling hundreds of employment disputes; and helped facilitate, design and implement dispute resolution programs for NCRC and others. He has also prepared and presented programs on the elimination of bias with Justice Goodwin Liu of the California Supreme Court and Judge Margaret McKeown of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.
ACHIEVEMENTS & AWARDS:
Rich has been honored in every edition of The Best Lawyers in America® since 1987. He has also been ranked for years among the “Best Lawyers in San Diego,” “Best Employment Lawyers in San Diego,” “San Diego Super Lawyers,” “Best Labor and Employment Counsel in California,” “Southern California Super Lawyers,” and similar publications. In 2011 and 2013 he was named the single “Lawyer of the Year” in employment and labor by Best Lawyers.
TESTIMONIALS:
Rich Paul was very instrumental in helping the parties reach a reasonable resolution. My clients and I greatly appreciated his candor, guidance, and diligence. He did a great job.
-Thomas S. Ingrassia
Shareholder, Pettit Kohn Ingrassia Lutz & Dolin
HOBBIES & INTERESTS:
A musician in his spare time, Rich plays in a rock n’ roll band in San Diego and has been active in representing the interests of the San Diego Symphony and its musicians. Rich also enjoys retreating to his cabin in SE Alaska for R and R. He is a long-time resident of Mission Hills.
RECENT ARTICLES:
Author, Atmospheres and Environments — Reflections on Reconstructing Sexual Harassment and The Sanitized Workplace (Mathew Bender and Thos. Jefferson L. Rev., 2006); co-author, with Lisa Hird Chung, Brave New Cyberworld: The Employer’s Legal Guide to the Interactive Internet, The Labor Lawyer, Vol. 24, No. 1, at 109 (Summer, 2008); author, Brave New Cyberworld Revisited, The Computer and Internet Lawyer, Vol. 27 no. 3, p.1 (2010); author, Bullying in the Workplace: Why Current Law Does not Work, and What to Do About It (2012), excerpted 1 Cal. Bus. Practice 16 (2013); co-author, with Michalowski and Fischbein, Public Sector Complex Whistleblowing and Retaliation Issues (National Employment Law Institute, 2015); author, An Introduction to Implicit Bias (Am. Inns of Court, 2017); author, Stand Up and Sing: A Brief Survey on the Rights and Limitations on Demonstrative Speech by Athletes in America (Am. Inns of Court, 2018).
RECENT PRESS:
Rich has made media appearances in San Diego and elsewhere related to labor and employment issues, and provides source materials for investigative reporters, most recently with Ben Folds of the Wall Street Journal concerning the Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company policy on political insignia at work.