Steven E. Wolfe

I have devoted my legal career to helping individuals stand up to their employers. I help people fight for overtime pay that their employers have illegally denied them. I help people overcome unlawful workplace discrimination, harassment, and retaliation. I help people negotiate severances and job transitions. I do not represent victims. I represent people who have the courage to make things right.

To help prevent workplace legal violations in the first place, I consult with select employers who are committed to doing right by their employees and who want to avoid cookie-cutter HR training solutions and big law firms’ billing rates.

I am also a mediator specializing in helping people and employers resolve their employment-related disputes. For more about my mediation practice and to inquire about my availability for mediation, please follow this link to my profile with Bay Mediation & Arbitration Service Wolfe, Steven E. – Bay Mediation & Arbitration Services (bayadr.com) or contact me directly.

I grew up in Hamilton Township, Pennsylvania where, so far as I know, there are still no traffic lights. As the son of an attorney and a public school teacher, I learned from an early age that different careers bring different challenges and rewards, and that valuable work takes many forms. After college at Boston University, I moved to Atlanta for Emory Law School. I have proudly called the city home for well over half my life.

As a child, I dreamed of becoming an astronaut. In college, I even tried to design a zero gravity experiment so NASA would let me fly on its weightless training aircraft, the “Vomit Comet.” Only my poor eyesight, terrible math skills, and the fact that children’s amusement park rides make me dizzy dashed my hopes of flying in space.

Later, when I discovered my love of politics and philosophy, I was set to follow my father’s footsteps into the law. Since my father also cursed me with a life-long love of Philadelphia sports teams, which has caused me immeasurable misery, I consider us even.

I live in Atlanta’s Northlake neighborhood with my wife, Cristiane, who is a brilliant corporate attorney, my sons, Jake and Caleb, and our dog. I love hiking, photography, and reading history or anything to do with the space program. I also enjoy watching horrendous science fiction movies, picking up heavy things, practicing jiujitsu, and playing the piano very badly. I am more than two-thirds of the way to my goal of hiking in every national park in North America.

While at Buckley & Klein, LLP, I won a $500,000 verdict for a MARTA manager who reported race discrimination at work. After the judge granted JMOL, I argued the case in the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals and got the verdict restored. Connelly v. MARTA, N.D. Ga. Civil Action No. 1:11-cv-02108, and Eleventh Circuit Appeal No. 13-14032 (published order).

While at Buckley & Klein, LLP, I argued in the Georgia Supreme Court and won a unanimous decision for Atlanta firefighters who were stripped of their ranks without due process of law. Barham v. City of Atlanta, 292 Ga. 375, 375 (Ga. 2013). Here is a video of me arguing the case.

Sitting second-chair to Bill Atkins while at Parks, Chesin & Walbert, P.C., I won a $350,000 verdict for a woman wrongly imprisoned by a storeowner who falsely accused her of cashing bad checks. Bailey v. Patel et. al., Rockdale County Superior Court Case No. 2006-SV-2261.

While at Buckley & Klein, LLP, I represented a class of inside sales people who were denied overtime, reaching a class-wide settlement worth more than 90% of the maximum possible recovery.

While at Buckley & Klein, LLP, I represented a female executive who was denied equal compensation based on gender and reached a confidential settlement of more than $2 million.

While at Buckley & Klein, LLP, I represented a salesperson who claimed he was fired because of his age, reaching a confidential settlement of more than $700,000.

While at Parks, Chesin & Walbert, P.C., I represented a police officer who blew the whistle on security risks at the Port of Savannah, obtaining a published summary judgment order in his client’s favor and reaching a nearly $500,000 settlement. Pattee v. Georgia Ports Authority, et al., 477 F.Supp.2d 1253 (S.D. Ga. 2006).

In 2015 I was honored to be named to the Daily Report “On the Rise” list of top attorneys under 40. Read the article here. (Must be a subscriber or sign up for a free subscription.)

I served as the 2015 president of the National Employment Lawyers Association (NELA)– Georgia, the bar organization for employee rights lawyers in our state. I am also a member of the NELA organization.

My peers have selected me as an Atlanta Magazine Rising Star or Super Lawyer every year in which I have been eligible.

I served on a panel that helped revise the Eleventh Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals’ pattern jury instructions for employment cases, contributing to the jury charges now used in the federal trial courts of Georgia, Alabama, and Florida

I have spoken at continuing legal education seminars on trial and litigation tactics, restrictive covenants in employment agreements, and other topics. I have also been a guest speaker at Emory Law School’s employment law seminar.

I am a member of the Georgia Trial Lawyers Association, the Atlanta Bar Association, the American Bar Association, and the Lawyers Club of Atlanta.

I am licensed to practice in the United States District Courts for the Northern and Middle Districts of Georgia, the Eleventh Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, and Georgia’s trial, Appeals, and Supreme Courts.
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