From JDSupra, Richard Reibstein reports that a paralegal has sued a law firm after the firm hired her as an independent contractor after she had been working as an employee for years. Richard writes:
A paralegal has sued an immigration law firm in a Georgia federal court seeking overtime compensation violations of the Fair Labor Standard Act due to her alleged misclassification as an IC. In her complaint, the paralegal claimed that from October 2016 until July 2020, the firm treated her as a W-2 employee. She alleged that when she began a second engagement as a paralegal at the firm from October 2020 until November 2022, she was misclassified as an IC – even though her responsibilities and hours of work did not differ from her previous role. The paralegal asserted in her complaint that she was always paid by the firm on a salary basis without overtime compensation for the hours worked in excess of 40 in a week; her work did not involve independent discretion; and the firm supervised her work and provided her with the work she performed. Lozano v. Ibrahim & Rao LLP Immigration and Nationality Law, No. 1:22-cv-05024 (N.D. Ga. Dec. 21, 2022).
