Litigation
Jun. 15, 2002
Family Business
Top 30 Women Litigators - Donna D. Melby - Los Angeles attorney Donna D. Melby has a strong father to thank, in part, for her successful career as a defense attorney in labor, employment and commercial litigation.
Donna D. Melby
Los Angeles attorney Donna D. Melby has a strong father to thank, in part, for her successful career as a defense attorney in labor, employment and commercial litigation.
"My father was a trial lawyer, and I had the opportunity to see him in trial," Melby recalls. "I liked what I saw, and I pretty much always wanted to be a lawyer."
She graduated from Loyola Law School in 1978 and since then has worked her way up to partner and head of the employment group at Los Angeles' Sedgwick, Detert, Moran & Arnold. On June 3, Melby moved to the Los Angeles offices of Chicago-based Sonnenchein, Nath & Rosenthal to co-head the firm's labor and employment group.
Melby remembers one of her first cases in federal court as a situation in which being a woman made a big difference.
The judge had a reputation for "being hard on young women lawyers," she says.
"When he instructed the jury, he said, 'I don't want you to vote for any particular side just because you think one lawyer is prettier than any other,' and of course there were no other women lawyers on the case," she recalls, laughing.
Melby recently won on affirmative defenses in a case in which she represented the Los Angeles County district attorney's office in a suit for retaliation brought by a woman against former District Attorney Gil Garcetti.
Melby is a member of the American Board of Trial Advocates, a fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers and a member of numerous other litigation groups.
Although she has found litigation rewarding, Melby says she never expected her son, Matt, 19, to follow in her footsteps. He always had said he didn't want to be a lawyer "because they work too hard." But she says she was shocked and thrilled recently when Matt announced he wanted to become an attorney.
Christina Landers
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