Top Rated Employment & Labor Attorney in New York, NY

Andrew Melzer is a Partner in the New York office of Sanford Heisler Sharp, LLP, a national law firm with offices in the District of Columbia, New York, California, Tennessee, and Maryland, and a Co-Chair of the firm’s Wage and Hour Practice. He received his J.D. from New York University School of Law and his B.A. from Yale University.

Andrew manages all aspects of complex litigation from the initial investigation to pleadings, discovery, class certification, dispositive motions, trial practice, and settlement. He represents individuals in class and collective actions involving wage and hour, discrimination, and consumer protection claims. He also represents individuals in employment, qui tam, and other civil rights matters.

His recent matters include Smith et al. v. Merck, a nationwide gender discrimination class action on behalf of pharmaceutical sales representatives; Ravina v. Columbia Univ., a gender discrimination and retaliation case which resulted in a $1.25 million jury verdict; and In re Gateway Plaza Residents Litigation, an action by tenants of an NYC housing complex alleging breach of the implied warranty of habitability and other claims.

Andrew was trial counsel in a civil rights and wrongful death suit against Sonoma County and numerous other defendants in George v. Sonoma County, et al. who refused to treat plaintiffs’ son’s sickle-cell anemia crisis, which eventually led to his death. The case — which went to a jury trial against certain defendants – resulted in monetary settlements of more than $2 million, as well as an independent third-party study of and changes in the medical and correctional practices of the jail. He also served as trial counsel in Perkins, et al. v. Southern New England Telephone Co., a wage and hour class action that settled post-trial, and played key roles in two related cases which settled for a combined $27 million, making this among the largest recent wage and hour settlements.

Andrew has drafted briefs and petitions to US Courts of Appeals, the United States Supreme Court, and the California Supreme Court. Prior to joining the firm, he was a staff attorney at an international organization in Zurich, that restored lost and stolen assets to Holocaust victims and their heirs. From 2003 to 2005, he was a judicial law clerk on the Massachusetts Appeals Court for Chief Justice Christopher Armstrong and legendary jurist Benjamin Kaplan. In 2002, Andrew was a McCleary Law Fellow at the Human Rights Campaign where he contributed to an amicus brief submitted by civil rights organizations in Lawrence v. Texas.