Law firm DLA Piper, ex-lawyer clash over past pregnancy bias complaints

Facing claims that it fired one of its U.S. lawyers for seeking maternity leave, global law firm DLA Piper is fighting to conceal details of past pregnancy discrimination complaints that it says must remain confidential.

Plaintiff Anisha Mehta and her lawyers at Wigdor on Tuesday rejected an offer by the firm that it provide affidavits describing the earlier claims instead of producing the full records, accusing DLA Piper of "hiding behind" evidentiary rules that it said do not apply.

Mehta sued the law firm last June in Manhattan federal court, alleging she was fired from her position as a senior associate when she was six months pregnant, less than a week after she asked for leave.

DLA Piper has denied the allegations, saying Mehta was "unable to perform at the level expected of a seventh-year associate."

Wigdor's Jeanne Christensen declined to comment, saying Mehta's court filings speak for themselves. A spokesperson for DLA Piper did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

A U.S. magistrate judge this month ordered DLA Piper to turn over records relating to two other lawyers who also complained about alleged pregnancy discrimination at the firm since 2016. The firm countered in a Monday letter that the "confidential settlement demands" were made by lawyers who had already been fired and are irrelevant to the case.

The two unnamed lawyers, who are not parties to the dispute between Mehta and DLA Piper, did not file a complaint with the firm's resources department or with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, nor did they file a lawsuit, DLA Piper said.

Mehta's lawyers rejected the firm's arguments in their Tuesday filing.

"Defendant should not be given carte blanche to create their own scrubbed version of the former employees' claims, regardless of the 'form' the facts were presented to defendant in," Christensen wrote in a letter to U.S. Magistrate Judge Robyn Tarnofsky.

The case is Mehta v. DLA Piper, U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, 1:23-cv-04757

For Anisha Mehta: Monica Hincken and Jeanne Christensen of Wigdor

For DLA Piper: Harris Mufson, Michele Maryott and Molly Senger of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher