Russell L. Kornblith

Top rated Employment Litigation attorney in New York, New York

Sanford Heisler Sharp McKnight, LLP
Russell L. Kornblith
Sanford Heisler Sharp McKnight, LLP

Practice areas: Employment Litigation, Civil Litigation, Civil Rights; view more

Licensed in New York since: 2015

Education: Harvard Law School

Selected to Super Lawyers: 2024 - 2025 Selected to Rising Stars: 2020 - 2023
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Sanford Heisler Sharp McKnight, LLP

17 State Street
Suite 3700
New York, NY 10004 Visit website

Details

Russell L. Kornblith is a Partner in the New York Office of Sanford Heisler Sharp McKnight, LLP, and the firm's General Counsel. He also serves as Co-Chair of the Executive Representation Practice Group. His areas of practice center around representing individuals and classes in matters involving discrimination, civil rights, whistleblower/qui tam, and employment retaliation.

Clients recognize Mr. Kornblith as a knowledgeable, professional, and pragmatic lawyer. Mr. Kornblith pays attention to every detail of a case, including its human side, making potentially stressful processes as easy and comfortable as possible. He does so across a range of industries, having successfully represented clients from the C-suite to the front line in cases against Fortune 500 companies, big law firms, financial institutions, pharmaceutical companies and advertising agencies. He has also played a pivotal role in various well-known class action cases across the country.

Mr. Kornblith graduated from Amherst College magna cum laude and earned his Juris Doctor cum laude from the Harvard Law School. In law school, he was an articles editor of the Harvard Civil Rights-Civil Liberties Law Review, a research assistant to the now-Deputy Dean, I. Glenn Cohen, and a clinical student in the International Human Rights Clinic, where he drafted several briefs to the Supreme Court of the United States. He has also completed an exchange fellowship program at the École Normale Supérieure.

Mr. Kornblith is admitted to practice in the states of New York and California as well as in the U.S. Courts of Appeals for the 1st, 2nd, 5th, and 6th Circuits; the U.S. District Courts for the Central and Southern Districts of California; the U.S. District Courts for the Southern and Eastern Districts of New York; and the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Tennessee. He is a member of the National Employment Lawyers Association/New York’s Amicus Committee and the Taxpayers Against Fraud.

Practice areas

Employment Litigation: Plaintiff, Civil Litigation: Plaintiff, Civil Rights, Employment & Labor: Employee, Class Action/Mass Torts: Plaintiff

Focus areas

Class Actions, Discrimination, Employment Discrimination, Employment Law - Employee, Retaliation, Sexual Harassment, Wage & Hour Laws, Whistleblower

  • 30% Employment Litigation: Plaintiff
  • 20% Civil Litigation: Plaintiff
  • 20% Civil Rights
  • 20% Employment & Labor: Employee
  • 10% Class Action/Mass Torts: Plaintiff

First Admitted: 2013, California

Professional Webpage: https://www.sanfordheisler.com/team/russell-kornblith/

Bar/Professional Activity:
  • New York, 2015
  • Taxpayers Against Fraud
  • NELA/NY
  • NELA/NY Amicus Committee
  • Law360’s 2020 Legal Industry Editorial Advisory Board
  • U.S. District Court for the Western District of Tennessee
  • U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York
  • U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York
  • U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California
  • U.S. District Court for the Central District of California
  • U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit
  • U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
  • U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit
  • U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit
  • California, 2013
Verdicts/Settlements (Case Results):
  • Mr. Kornblith represented the relator in a whistleblower action for customs fraud, brought under the False Claims Act against International Vitamin Corporation ("IVC"). The case alleged that IVC knowingly and systematically skirted customs duties on thousands of imports of nutritional supplements from China between January 1, 2015 and September 13, 2019 by fraudulently reporting incorrect tariff classifications and duty rates on the imports. In 2023, IVC agreed to a settlement with the U.S. Government totaling over $22 million. The relator represented by Mr. Kornblith received 20% of the settlement. , 2023
  • Mr. Kornblith represented the plaintiff, Dr. Emma Adams, in her disability discrimination lawsuit brought under the Fair Housing Act in U.S. District Court for the Central District of California against Defendants FirstService Residential California, LLC, Aqua 388 Community Association, and Aqua Maintenance Corporation (Adams v. Aqua Community Association, et al., case # 2:23-cv-02498-SB-JPR). In December 2024, a jury awarded Dr. Adams $7.4 million in damages, including $400,000 in punitive damages.  Dr. Adams is a tenured Associate Professor and uses a wheelchair accessible van because she is a paraplegic. The evidence showed that for more than two years, the Defendants failed to accommodate Dr. Adams’s request for an accessible parking space in the garage of her home, the Aqua towers in Long Beach, California. As a result, she could not come and go freely from her home, causing her to feel captive and resulting in extreme mental, physical, and emotional distress., 2024
  • Mr. Kornblith represented Dr. Emma Adams in her disability discrimination lawsuit in U.S. District Court for the Central District of California against First Service Residential California, LLC, Aqua 388 Community Association, and Aqua Maintenance Corporation (Adams v. Aqua Community Association, et al., case 2:23-cv-02498-SB-JPR).  In December 2024, a jury awarded Dr. Adams $7.4 million in damages, including $400,000 in punitive damages. Dr. Adams, a tenured Associate Professor who uses a wheelchair accessible van because she is a paraplegic, brought her claims under the Fair Housing Act after Defendants failed to accommodate her request for an assigned accessible parking space in the garage of her home, the Aqua towers in Long Beach, California, which caused Dr. Adams to feel trapped in her home and resulted in extreme mental, physical, and emotional distress.    , 2024
  • Mr. Kornblith represented a class of nearly 2,000 women in California federal court in a class and collective action against Western Digital Corporation and Western Digital Technologies alleging sex discrimination and unequal pay. In 2021, the parties reached a settlement of $7.75 million., 2021
Honors/Awards:
  • Benchmark Litigation Labor & Employment Star - Northeast, Benchmark Litigation, 2020
  • 2025 Best Lawyers in America: Ones to Watch, Best Lawyers, 2025
  • https://benchmarklitigation.com/Lawyer/Russell-Kornblith/Profile/87124#profile, Benchmark Litigation 40 & Under List, Benchmark Litigation, 2023
  • https://www.lawdragon.com/guides/2023-07-28-the-2023-lawdragon-500-leading-civil-rights-plaintiff-employment-lawyers, Lawdragon 500 Leading Civil Rights & Plaintiff Lawyers, Lawdragon, 2023
  • 2021 Benchmark Litigation Labor & Employment Star – Northeast in the practice area of Labor & Employment
  • 2020-2023 New York Metro Super Lawyer Rising Star
  • 2020-22 Lawdragon 500 Plaintiff Employment Lawyer
  • Rising Star, Law360
  • 2019 Benchmark Litigation Labor & Employment Star - Northeast in the practice area of Labor & Employment, Benchmark Litigation Labor & Employment Star, Benchmark Litigation, 2019
  • 2018 Benchmark Litigation Labor & Employment Star - Northeast in the practice area of Labor & Employment, Benchmark Litigation Labor & Employment Star, Benchmark Litigation, 2018
Educational Background:
  • Exchange Fellow, l’École Normale Supérieure
  • B.A., Amherst College, magna cum laude, 2006

Office location for Russell L. Kornblith

17 State Street
Suite 3700
New York, NY 10004

Phone: 646-512-8609

Selections

2 Years Super Lawyers
4 Years Rising Stars
  • Super Lawyers: 2024 - 2025
  • Rising Stars: 2020 - 2023

Attorney resources for Russell L. Kornblith

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