Matthew Patton is a committed advocate for economic and social justice who represents workers in wage and hour litigation, employment discrimination matters, and labor disputes in state and federal courts and before administrative agencies. He is currently engaged in a number of collective and class actions and individual employment matters involving workers across industries in the private and public sectors.

Prior to joining Lichten & Liss-Riordan, Matt developed and litigated healthcare fraud recovery actions under the federal False Claims Act and RICO Act.

While in law school, Matt assisted the City of Boston in enforcing landlord compliance with low-income rental restrictions to ensure tenants were not being taken advantage of. Prior to practicing law, Matt worked to advance issues critical to reducing income inequality, such as an increase to the minimum wage, paid sick leave, and universal pre-kindergarten. Throughout his adult life Matt has volunteered with the Special Olympics International—including assisting in the launch of their campaign to end discrimination against individuals with intellectual disabilities–Spread the Word to End the Word.

IN THE NEWS

Troopers sue Mass. State Police for alleged discrimination against new parents
Boston Globe | March, 2022

EDUCATION

New England Law Boston, J.D., 2018
The Catholic University of America, B.A., 2005

BAR AND COURT ADMISSIONS

Member, State Bar of Massachusetts, 2018

Admitted to practice before the U.S. District Court of Massachusetts

Krysten Connon is an experienced and dedicated attorney. She represents workers in disputes against their employers and primarily concentrates her practice on wage and hour class and collective actions arising under the Fair Labor Standards Act and state laws. Krysten has represented workers from a variety of backgrounds and in various industries, including cable and satellite installers, delivery drivers, and nurses.

Krysten graduated summa cum laude from the Drexel University Thomas R. Kline School of Law, and she is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of the University of Maryland. Following law school, Krysten served as a federal judicial law clerk before joining the commercial litigation department of a national law firm, where she represented clients in complex commercial litigation and arbitration matters. Krysten also worked as a Staff Attorney at Women Against Abuse, where she litigated cases originating as domestic violence matters. Prior to joining Lichten & Liss-Riordan, Krysten worked as an attorney in the employment rights group of a plaintiff-side class action law firm.

Additionally, Krysten co-authored the 2015 Oxford University Press book, Living in the Crosshairs: The Untold Stories of Anti-Abortion Terrorism, which presents the results of extensive interviews with abortion providers around the intersections of law, policy, and anti-abortion violence. She regularly volunteers her time and expertise on issues related to reproductive health, rights, and justice.

Krysten was named a Pennsylvania Rising Star in 2020 and 2021 by Thomson Reuters’ Super Lawyers. .

EDUCATION

Drexel University Thomas R. Kline School of Law, JD, summa cum laude, 2012
University of Maryland – College Park, cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa, 2009

BAR AND COURT ADMISSIONS

Member, State Bar of New Jersey, 2013
Member, State Bar of Pennsylvania, 2013

Admitted to practice before the U.S. District Court of New Jersey, U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.

Biography

Sarah R. Schalman-Bergen is a partner at Lichten & Liss-Riordan P.C., who has dedicated her career to creating systemic change for workers and individuals who are not being treated fairly. She has secured numerous significant settlements for the workers she represents, totaling well over $100 million.

While representing workers in all types of industries, Sarah has successfully challenged unlawful business practices involving last-mile logistics companies, cable installation companies, home health aide companies, meat and poultry plants, landscaping companies, in white collar jobs, and in the government. This litigation has resulted both in payment of back wages and in practice changes by the companies.

Sarah also represents clients in antitrust cases involving labor markets. For example, she has prosecuted challenges to “no poach” agreements that allegedly suppressed employees’ wages, and she has defended clients against antitrust claims brought to impede their rights to organize for better working conditions. Sarah also represented the City of Philadelphia against a major bank for allegedly discriminatory practices, in violation of the Fair Housing Act.

Sarah works in partnership and routinely co-counsels with public interest law firms to lend expertise to their mission in litigation. She has served as volunteer of counsel to the AIDS Law Project of Pennsylvania for more than a decade, litigating discrimination and HIV-confidentiality cases. Sarah was honored for this work as an “Unsung Hero” by the Legal Intelligencer, Pennsylvania’s daily law journal.

Sarah conducts her practice according to the highest ethical standards, and has received high judicial praise, including being described as “ethical, talented, and motivated to help hard working men and women” and “some of the finest legal representation in the nation.”

Sarah routinely speaks at conferences on issues relating to workers’ rights. She currently serves on Cornell’s ILR-Hotel School CIHLER Advisory Board, and is a Board Member of the Keystone Research Center. Sarah was named a 2020 Pennsylvania Super Lawyer, after being named as a Rising Star in every year over the prior decade. In 2021, she was named in Best Lawyers in America. In 2015, she was honored as a “Lawyer on the Fast Track” by The Legal Intelligencer.

Prior to joining the Firm, Sarah was a partner at a plaintiff-side class action law firm, where she served as co-chair of the firm’s employment rights practice group. She has also practiced in the litigation department at a large Philadelphia firm, where she represented clients in a variety of industries in complex commercial litigation. Sarah received her J.D. cum laude from Harvard Law School and her B.A. summa cum laude from Tufts University.

PROMINENT JUDGMENTS AND SETTLEMENTS

Hickman v. TL Transportation, LLC, Amazon.com, et al., No. 2:17-cv-01038-GAM; 317 F. Supp. 3d 890; 318 F. Supp. 3d 718 (E.D. Pa. 2020) ($1.8m settlement on behalf of Delivery Associates in wage claim against third party company of Amazon; favorable opinions on liability, personal jurisdiction, individual liability, and conditional certification)

Merino v. Wells Fargo & Co., 2:16-cv-07840-ES-MAH (D.N.J. 2020) (co-lead counsel in $35 million wage and hour settlement on behalf of personal bankers)

Holbert v. Waste Management, Inc., No. 2:18-cv-02649-CMR (E.D. Pa. 2019) (lead counsel in $14.7 million FLSA nationwide settlement on behalf of 31,000 waste collectors)

Nicks v. Koch Meat Co., Inc., No. 16-cv-6446; 2016 WL 6277489; 260 F. Supp. 3d 942; 265 F. Supp. 3d 841 (N.D. Ill. 2019) ($1,832,000 settlement on behalf of chicken catchers in wage claim against national integrated poultry processor; favorable opinions on jurisdiction, corporate entity structure, certification)

City of Philadelphia v. Wells Fargo & Co., 2:17-cv-02203-AB, 2018 WL 424451 (E.D. Pa. 2019) (represented City of Philadelphia in Fair Housing Act litigation resolved for $10 million and injunctive relief for sustainable housing-related programs to promote and preserve homeownership for low- and moderate-income residents.)

Smith v. Allegheny Technologies, Inc., 754 Fed. Appx. 136 (3d Cir. 2018) (allegations by temporary workers hired to cross picket line and work in steel plant during lockout of union workers were sufficient to state claim for travel time compensation under Pennsylvania law)

Beckett v. Aetna, Inc., 2:17-cv-03864 (E.D. Pa. 2018) (Co-lead counsel with AIDS Law Project of Pennsylvania and Legal Action Center in $17 million settlement for the largest HIV confidentiality breach in U.S. on behalf of 12,000 class members)

The Broadway League v. Bernard Telsey Casting, Inc., Internat’l Brotherhood of Teamsters Theatrical Drivers and Helpers Local 817, et al., No. 1:17-cv-9515 (S.D.N.Y. 2018) (defended casting directors and union in antitrust action challenging lawfulness of organizing activity)

Smith v. Milton Hershey School, No. 11-7391, 2012 WL 1966125 (E.D. Pa. 2012) ($730,000 and injunctive relief settlement on behalf of 13 year old student alleged to have been refused enrollment in school because of his HIV status)

Canal Side Care Manor, LLC v. Pa. H.R.C., 30 A.3d 568 (Commw. Ct. 2011) (affirming $55,000 trial award on behalf of HIV positive woman denied housing at personal care home)

TIAA-CREF v. Bernardo, 683 F. Supp. 2d 344 (E.D. Pa. 2010) (summary judgment in declaratory judgment action to award retirement benefits to domestic partner of deceased doctor)

EDUCATION

Harvard Law School, J.D., cum laude, 2007
Tufts University, B.A., summa cum laude, 2001

BAR AND COURT ADMISSIONS

Member, Bar of Pennsylvania, 2007

Admitted to practice before the U.S. Supreme Court; U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third, Fourth, Sixth, Eighth and Ninth Circuits; U.S. District Courts for the Eastern, Middle, and Western Districts of Pennsylvania, District of Colorado, Eastern and Western Districts of Arkansas, Northern District of New York, Northern District of Illinois, Southern District of Indiana, Northern District of Ohio, Eastern District of Michigan, Western District of Tennessee, Southern and Eastern District of Texas, District of Nebraska; and U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.

Zach Rubin is a committed employees’ rights advocate who represents workers in wage and hour litigation, employment discrimination matters, and labor disputes in state and federal courts and before administrative agencies. He is currently engaged in a number of collective and class actions and individual employment matters involving workers across industries in the private and public sectors.

Zach has practiced labor and employment law since graduating from law school and previously worked for a prominent union-side law firm in Connecticut and as in-house counsel at a labor union in Connecticut. Zach enjoys the breadth of factual and legal issues that labor and employment attorneys must grapple with and has played key roles in litigation victories for his clients, including a 2017 case establishing that the employment protections in Connecticut’s medical marijuana statute are not preempted by federal law (the first time a federal court ruled on such an issue).

During law school, Zach worked as a law clerk at a union-side labor law firm in New York City and interned at Actors’ Equity Association, the National Labor Relations Board (Region 2), the New York State Supreme Court (trial level), and the NYC Office of Collective Bargaining. Additionally, Zach has long appreciated the importance of Alternative Dispute Resolution (“ADR”) in modern legal practice and served as Co-President of Brooklyn Law School’s ADR Society.

Zach was named a Massachusetts Rising Star in 2021 and 2022 by Thomson Reuters’ Super Lawyers.

Education

Brooklyn Law School, J.D., 2015
Cornell University, B.S. in Industrial and Labor Relations, 2012

Bar and Court Admissions

Member, State Bar of Massachusetts, 2019
Member, State Bar of Connecticut, 2016
Member, State Bar of New York, 2016
Member, State Bar of New Jersey, 2015

Admitted to practice before the U.S. District Court of Massachusetts, U.S. District Court of Connecticut, U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, U.S. District Court of New Jersey, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First, Second, Third, and Fifth Circuit.

Olena Savytska is a dedicated and persistent client advocate and combines her experience in civil litigation and direct services in her work, approaching every case as a puzzle. Olena has focused on FLSA wage and hour actions in a variety of industries.

Olena began her work in wage and hour actions at the Harvard Legal Aid Bureau, where she represented dry cleaning and restaurant workers. As a student at Columbia Law School, Olena helped prepare and present a report to New York State agency members and legislators as part of the Lawyering in the Digital Age Clinic and took part in the 2013 National Native American Law Students Association moot court competition.

During college, Olena worked as a paralegal, gaining significant experience in civil discovery and trial preparation. Olena is fluent in Spanish and Russian.

Education

Columbia Law School, J.D.
Boston College, BA in Political Science and Economics, cum laude

Bar and Court Admissions

Member, State Bar of Massachusetts, 2015

Admitted to practice before the U.S. District Court of Massachusetts

Biography

Harold Lichten is a founding partner of the firm and has been practicing labor and employment law for over 40 years. His practice now focuses on employment related class actions and individual litigation involving the misclassification of employees as independent contractors; failure to pay wages and overtime; discrimination; and wrongful termination. Since the beginning of his career as a legal services lawyer fighting for the rights of low-income workers, Mr. Lichten has been deeply committed to the field of civil rights and equal employment opportunity. He has been lead or co-counsel in landmark employment discrimination, wage and hour, and independent contractor misclassification cases throughout the United States. He has successfully argued appeals before the Supreme Court’s of Maine, Massachusetts, Hawaii, and New Jersey, and in the United States Court of Appeals for the First, Third, Seventh, Sixth, Eleventh and Ninth Circuits. In 2003 and 2015 he was named a Massachusetts Lawyer of the Year for his work in challenging the discriminatory hiring practices of police and fire departments within the state. Bradley v City of Lynn et al 443 F. Supp. 2d 145 (D. Mass); Smith v City of Boston 144 F. Supp. 3d 177 (D. Mass. 2015).

In 2017, his case Gannon vs City of Boston 476 Mass. 786  (2017), established that employers could not discriminate against disabled workers, unless they could prove the worker posed a significant risk of harm to themselves or others. In 2015, in the landmark case of Hargrove vs  Sleepy`s , he successfully argued for the adoption of the strict ABC test in New Jersey for determining independent contractor misclassification, and later succeeded in having the US Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, reverse the denial of class certification in that same case.  947 F3d 467 (2020).

In a series of cases, before the US Courts of Appeal for the Seventh, Third, First and Ninth Circuits, he successfully defended state wage act claims, against arguments that they were preempted by federal law, or subject to arbitration under the Federal Arbitration Act. Bedoya v. Am. Eagle Express Inc., 914 F.3d 812, 815 (3d Cir. 2019), Waithaka v. Amazon.com, Inc., 966 F.3d 10 (1st Cir. 2020).

Mr. Lichten and his firm, are currently actively involved in litigating cases across the country, on behalf of delivery drivers, cable and satellite TV installers, salespersons, and marketers improperly classified as independent contractors, and thereby denied wages and overtime. They are also litigating cases involving chain stores and service stations which have improperly classified their store managers as exempt from overtime.

Mr. Lichten currently splits his time between New England and South Carolina and actively litigates cases  across the United States.

Major Cases

Pace v. City of Lynn, Case No. 11-01360, slip op. (Essex Super. Ct., June 6, 2014) (whistleblower case involving city employee with a multi-million dollar verdict won for plaintiff)

Martins, et al. v. 3PD, Inc., 2013 WL 1320454 (D. Mass 2013) (won class certification and summary judgment that appliance delivery drivers were employees, not independent contractors)

Sam Hargrove, et al. v. Sleepy’s, et al., Case Nos. 12-2541/12-2542 (3rd Cir. 2013) (won reversal and remand of decision finding New Jersey truck drivers to be independent contractors, not employees of Sleepy’s)

Scantland, et al. v. Jeffry Knight, Inc., et al., 721 F.3d 1308 (11th Cir. 2013) (reversing trial court ruling that cable installers were properly classified as independent contractors)

Lopez, et al. v. Commonwealth of Massachusetts, 463 Mass. 696 (2012) (Supreme Court of Massachusetts reversed lower court decision and held that the Commonwealth of Massachusetts may be held liable under state discrimination law for constructing discriminatory promotional exams)

In The News

Mr. Lichten was named a 2003 and 2015 Lawyer of the Year by Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly.

Boston police lieutenant exam discriminated against minorities, judge says
The Boston Globe | July, 2017

Judge rules Boston police exam discriminated against minorities
The Boston Globe | November, 2015

Court suspends probation officer demotions
The Boston Globe | August, 2015

MCAD ruling supports black Worcester officers passed over for promotion
Telegram & Gazette | July, 2015

NJ’s Definition of ‘Employee’ Revives Sleepy’s Class Suit
New Jersey Law Journal | May, 2015

Fired official wins suit vs. city
The Boston Globe | June, 2014

Black police officials sue city
The Boston Globe | February, 2012

Police hit with bias decision; Two officers may be due ‘millions’
Worcester Telegram | November, 2011

Endo Sales Reps Win Conditional Cert. For OT Suit
Law 360 | June, 2011

Sebring men sue MasTec for OT pay
Tampa Bay Online | June, 2010

Contractors cry foul over benefit-excluding system
St. Petersburg Times | December, 2009

Independent contractor decision has lawyers wary
Mass Lawyers Weekly | December, 2008

Judge says firefighter tests biased and unfair
The Boston Globe | August, 2006

Organized labor of love
The Boston Globe | February, 2005

Education

New York University School of Law, J.D., 1977
University of Pennsylvania, B.A., 1974

Professional Affiliations

Member, National Employment Lawyers Association
Member, AFL-CIO Lawyers Coordinating Committee

Bar and Court Admissions

Member, State Bar of Massachusetts, since 1987

Admitted to practice before the U.S. Supreme Court, U.S. District Court of Massachusetts, U.S. District Court of Maine, the U.S. Court of Appeals, First, Second, Third, Fourth, Sixth, Seventh, Ninth, Eleventh, and D.C. Circuits.

Practice Areas

Labor unions, wage and hour class actions, wrongful termination, employment discrimination