The Law Office of Richard T. Seymour, P.L.L.C. DC Labor and Employment Attorneys "We represent the dispossessed of the Earth, and executives recently shown the door. We also act as neutral investigators, mediators, and arbitrators." “Let justice roll down like a mighty river . . . .” - Adapted from Amos 5:24 “Justice, sir, is the great interest of man on earth.” - Daniel Webster, 1845 "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere...." - Martin Luther King, Jr., Letter from the Birmingham Jail, 1963 “They’re always talking about civil rights laws with teeth in them. What I want to know is, who’s going to chew?” - New Orleans civil rights attorney, 1968

© Photodisc/Getty Images "Lawyer of the Year" Metropolitan Washington Employment Lawyers Association, 2007

Helping people get justice seems to us a pretty worthwhile line of work. Our part of that work is civil rights, employment rights, and other civil litigation. If you’re interested in these topics, this web site is for you.

Richard Seymour's explanation of his approach: There were no lawyers in my family. I decided to go to law school because I was inspired by the freedom riders and lunch-counter demonstrators of the early 1960s, who were beaten and jailed just for sitting on the wrong side of the racially segregated color line. It reminded me of my mother’s telling me the difficulties she had getting a job because she was a woman. And it reminded me of my grandmother’s tales of looking for work as a young woman and seeing employer after employer with signs in their windows, saying “No Irish need apply.”

Browse to your heart’s content. We’ve prepared background information for you, and have arranged to have information from other sources on this web site. Richard Seymour has spent more than three and a half decades representing people with claims against big companies and government agencies. This site answers the questions we have most frequently asked.

If you are looking for an attorney to represent you, the information on this web site may help you make your choice. The clients in whom we are most interested are:

• Partners, managers, administrators, and others who need to negotiate reasonable compensation or severance or non-competition agreements.
• Whistleblowers (Sarbanes-Oxley, health & safety, and others).
• Former employees who are sued over unreasonable non-competition or “non-compete” agreements.
• Reasonable people who have serious problems in the workplace.
• Reasonable employees who are affected by the same problems that affect a large number of other employees. Even if individual damages are small, a case may make economic sense if enough other people have been harmed. Few employees would go to the expense of an individual lawsuit if he or she were cheated of two dollars’ pay a day. The expense of the suit would be far greater than the lost pay. If the same problem affected a thousand employees and had gone on for three years, however, the possible recovery is clearly great enough to justify going forward.

We keep using the word “reasonable” because the likelihood of winning or getting a good settlement is much higher when the client is reasonable, and reasonable people work best with an attorney and are likelier to follow sound legal advice. Judges and juries like reasonable people.

If you are outside the District of Columbia and have a matter involving State law, it will ordinarily be necessary to associate an attorney licensed to practice in the State in question.

We mediate disputes, investigate misconduct, consult on cases on a fee or contingency basis, and will co-counsel with other firms. Give us a call.

We arbitrate disputes: Richard Seymour is listed as an Arbitrator on the American Arbitration Association's Commercial Arbitrator Panel and its Employment Panel. Click here for more information.

Richard Seymour is rated “AV” by Martindale-Hubbell, the leading American and international lawyers’ directory and rating service. This is the highest possible rating, and is explained by Martindale-Hubbell as follows:

• AV Peer Review Rating - shows that a lawyer has reached the height of professional excellence. He or she has usually practiced law for many years, and is recognized for the highest levels of skill and integrity.

Important Information From The Association of Trial Lawyers of America