Chris D. Baker
Partner

Practice Areas

Experience

Chris Baker represents employers and employees in all employment-related cases, including cases involving retaliation, discrimination, harassment, wage and hour, lay-offs, employment contracts, non-compete clauses, and trade secret misappropriation. His clients range from multi-national and mid-market companies, to small businesses such as internet start-ups, to senior executives.  He has first chair trial and appellate experience and has litigated cases before federal and state courts, the National Labor Relations Board, Cal-OSHA, and other government agencies.   His experience includes large-scale litigation management and strategic partnering with corporate clients.  

Chris’s class action experience focuses on the creative management and resolution of class-wide or representative wage and hour and discrimination claims.   His white collar experience focuses on government and criminal investigations of alleged employer or employee misconduct, such as tax or workers compensation fraud, money laundering, and, particularly, employee injuries and death.   He also has represented clients in commercial disputes, unfair competition claims, and consumer civil rights claims.

Additionally, Chris has extensive experience in executive employment and severance agreements, non-competition and confidentiality agreements, collective bargaining negotiations, and the employment law implications of corporate transactions.

He counsels employers on all aspects of labor and employment law, including anti-harassment and other training of client personnel.

Following law school, Chris clerked for Judge Bailey Brown of the United States Court of Appeals For The Sixth Circuit.

Representative cases

• Represented contractor in criminal investigation arising from industrial accident that caused several serious employee injuries and one employee death; No criminal charges were filed and no OSHA citations were issued.
• Represented nationwide retailer in class action involving commission agreements, illegal chargebacks, and rate of pay violations;  Case resolved for nominal amount without class certification or class-wide settlement.   
• Defended world’s largest recycler in three-week trial involving claims of unfair competition and various tort claims;  Plaintiff received neither damages nor injunctive relief.  
• Successfactors v. Taleo Corp. - Represented Taleo in a trade secret claim by Successfactors alleging that a former Successfactors salesperson (and newly-hired Taleo salesperson) stole confidential information. Taleo defeated Successfactors' motion for a preliminary injunction and the court lifted Successfactors' temporary restraining order. The case settled shortly thereafter on terms satisfactory to Taleo.
• Obtained summary judgment and an award of attorneys fees against Plaintiff’s counsel in discrimination and harassment lawsuit. 
• Defeated unfair labor practice charges against hospital arising from its effort to prevent a union from engaging in a sympathy strike.

Publications and presentations

• “Workplace Safety (Chapter 13)”, California Practice Guide; Employment Litigation, The Rutter Group, 2005 ( Co-editor)
• “ADA Access: A New Practice Area For Employment Lawyers?” The San Francisco Recorder, April/May 1999 (Author)
• The Safety and Health Monitor, a biweekly newsletter on occupational safety and health (Former editor)
• The Employer's Pocket Guide To Cal/Osha, 1997 (Co-author)
• Dosh P&P C-1d: The New Cal/Osha Guidelines On The Contingent Workforce, 1996 (Co-author)
• “Sexual Harassment v. Labor Arbitration: Does Reinstating Sexual Harassers Violate Public Policy?” 61 U.Cinn.L.Rev. 1361 (1993) (Co-editor)

Admissions

Chris is admitted to practice in California and Ohio; the United States Supreme Court, the U.S. Courts of Appeals for the Sixth, Eighth, Ninth, and District of Columbia Circuits; and the U.S. District Courts of California.

Education

University of Cincinnati College of Law, J.D. (Editorial Board, Cincinnati Law Review; President, Student Bar Association)
University of Cincinnati, B.A., magna cum laude

Affiliations

Member of the Cal/OSH Advisory Committee on the multi-employer worksite regulation
Member of San Francisco and California bar associations