Photo: Diego M. Radzinschi/ALM

Three former nonequity shareholders at Ogletree Deakins Nash Smoak & Stewart have joined a $300 million collective action that accuses the labor and employment specialty law firm of operating as a male-dominated hierarchy that puts women at a disadvantage with respect to pay and promotions.

Bulking up a proposed class and collective action initially filed in January in San Francisco, an amended complaint filed May 11 names three new women—all former nonequity shareholders in either Denver or Dallas—who opted into a proposed collective action under the Equal Pay Act. The women join lead plaintiff Dawn Knepper, a former nonequity shareholder in Ogletree Deakins' Orange County, California, office. Knepper moved in February to Buchalter as a partner.

In a statement on Monday, the lead lawyer for the women, David Sanford of Sanford Heisler Sharp, indicated that there may soon be another amendment to the complaint with even more new plaintiffs. Sanford and his firm have been involved in several recent gender bias lawsuits aimed at large law firms, including some that have settled and one that remains pending against Proskauer Rose.

“Many current and former shareholders have reached out to our firm to discuss their experiences while at Ogletree,” he said.

Dawn Knepper

The amended complaint also adds two defendants—current Ogletree Deakins managing shareholder C. Matthew Keen and former managing shareholder Kim Ebert, who left that leadership slot in 2016. As firm leaders, both of the men allegedly contributed to gender discrimination at Ogletree Deakins, according to the suit.

“Ogletree leadership fosters or condones a firm culture that marginalizes, demeans, and undervalues women,” the amended complaint said. “Ogletree's leadership is aware of the firm's inequitable pay, promotion, job assignment, and other practices, but have taken no steps to remedy the root causes of the disparity.”

In a statement provided by an Ogletree Deakins spokesman, the firm said it would “confidently defend” itself in court and that the firm maintains a steadfast commitment to equal opportunity.

“Equal opportunity has been a core principle of Ogletree Deakins since the firm's founding, and we do not tolerate discrimination of any kind—gender or otherwise. We take the allegations filed by former shareholders very seriously,” the statement said. “However, the decision-making process that governs our compensation system is both fair and equitable. In fact, we are proud of our 'open compensation' system under which all shareholders in the firm know what every other shareholder earns—and the factors that support those determinations.”

With the May 11 amended complaint, Knepper is joined by Jocelyn Campanaro and Angelica Ochoa, both former nonequity shareholders in Ogletree Deakins' Denver outpost, as well as Dallas-based former nonequity shareholder Alicia Voltmer. Campanaro and Ochoa—both immigration specialists—left Ogletree Deakins for the Denver office of rival labor and employment law firm Fisher & Phillips, which they joined as partners in September 2015. Voltmer now practices at Lillard Wise Szygenda in Dallas, which she joined in March 2016.

While the amended complaint adds new plaintiffs and defendants, many of the allegations have remained the same since the suit was filed in January. The women shareholders allege that, despite Ogletree Deakins' vast experience advising employers on anti-discrimination laws, it has fallen short on the gender equity front within the firm.

Specifically, the suit alleges that women hold two of nine seats on the firm's board of directors and that men also dominate the compensation committee, and the ranks of its equity shareholders, a group that's approximately 80 percent male. The firm allegedly pays women shareholders $110,000 less on average than their male counterparts, the suit said.

Ogletree Deakins also allegedly favors men when assigning credits for originating or managing work, which tend to have a stronger influence on shareholder pay, according to the amended complaint. Women shareholders allegedly carry out more administrative tasks and “perform the bulk of the actual legal work” on cases, but those responsibilities tend not to make a huge difference in shareholder pay. The amended complaint alleges that Knepper, for example, spent more than 12 years at Ogletree Deakins but was never invited to a meeting to pitch business to a potential new client.

“As female shareholders draft briefs, supervise younger lawyers and non-lawyer staff, and handle a broad range of client demands, the firm selects male shareholders for pitch meetings, conferences, and other business development opportunities that enable those male shareholders to reap origination credit, management credit, and other compensation that is disproportionate to their contributions,” the amended complaint said.

Ogletree's statement on Monday disputes claims that women have fewer advancement opportunities and lower pay. The firm said that over the past four years, the majority of lawyers promoted to shareholder have been women, including eight of the 11 new shareholders announced in January 2018.

“Further, women are among our most successful lawyers, serving in leadership positions as members of our board of directors and compensation committee, office managing shareholders and practice group chairs,” the statement continued. “Of the four elected members of the compensation committee, two are women. All four serve alongside the firm's managing shareholder.”