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PRESS RELEASE

Bryan Schwartz Launches Oakland-Based Civil Rights, Employment Law Firm

January 6, 2009, Oakland -- Attorney Bryan Schwartz, who recently led the San Francisco office of Nichols Kaster, has opened his own practice in Oakland. Bryan Schwartz Law (www.bryanschwartzlaw.com) is dedicated to continuing the struggle for civil rights and equality of employment opportunity and helping Americans from every background to achieve their highest career potential. The firm will focus on individual, class, and collective actions involving discrimination and retaliation, harassment, denied disability accommodations, whistleblower reprisal, wage and hour violations, Federal employees' rights, and severance negotiations.

Mr. Schwartz, who began fighting for workers' rights nearly 15 years ago as an investigator with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, has practiced civil rights and employment law since he graduated from University of California Berkeley's Boalt Hall School of Law in 2000. After working on employment decisions as a law clerk for Judge Franklin Van Antwerpen in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, Mr. Schwartz represented employees through all stages of litigation with the firms Passman & Kaplan in Washington and Nichols Kaster in San Francisco. He also graduated, magna cum laude, in Government and English, from Cornell University.

In his legal career, Mr. Schwartz has:

proven discrimination and retaliation committed personally by a George W. Bush cabinet secretary;

achieved highly-publicized vindication for environmental whistleblower Seema Bhat, who was fired after she exposed excess lead in the Washington, DC, drinking water supply. The Washington Post editorial described the result with the headline, "Justice for Seema Bhat";

helped recover millions of dollars for thousands of workers deprived unlawfully of overtime and meal and rest period premiums nationwide;

and enabled numerous Federal Government employees to return to their jobs or begin new careers with full relief, after they were removed from employment improperly.

Bryan Schwartz Law is located at 180 Grand Avenue, Suite 1550, Oakland, CA 94612. The telephone number is (510) 444-9300.