Practice Areas Business Disputes Covenants Not to Compete & Trade Secrets Executive Compensation Fraud & Fiduciary Litigation Intellectual Property Oil & Gas/Energy Products Liability & Catastrophic Personal Injury Employment Litigation AZA has developed a national reputation in employment litigation. We typically receive over 100 phone calls a week on potential employment cases involving overtime claims under the FLSA, sexual harassment, retaliation, race, discrimination, Sarbanes-Oxley claims and others. The Firm selects only a fraction of these potential cases. AZA is frequently on the cutting edge of developments in employment law. For example, AZA successfully tried the first same-sex sexual harassment lawsuit in the United States (Mota v. University of Texas Houston Health Science Center, 261 F.3d 512 (5th Cir. 2001)). AZA obtained one of the first reported decisions under Sarbanes-Oxley (Collins v. Beazer Homes USA, Inc., 334 F.Supp.2d 1365 (N.D. Ga. 2004)). The Firm has also been on the cutting edge on developments under the Americans with Disabilities Act (Washington v. HCA, 199 F.3d 192 (5th Cir. 1999)). Our lawyers frequently speak at CLE seminars on all areas of employment law and the Firm is regularly hired to act as trial counsel to assist other law firms throughout the country in employment cases. AZA handles cases representing both management and employees as we believe this provides us with a unique perspective on how to best represent our clients. In addition to litigation, the Firm counsels numerous Fortune 500 companies on structuring layoffs, conducting internal investigations, and terminating and reprimanding employees so as to minimize the exposure to the company. Likewise, the Firm has counseled scores of individuals about their rights under the various employment laws while they are still employed with their company or organization and how to position themselves to achieve a favorable resolution. In many of these cases, the Firm is able to achieve an amicable resolution for the employee well before litigation is necessary. When such litigation is necessary, however, our lawyers are trial lawyers who have tried dozens of employment cases on both sides of the docket. Our lawyers have been recognized by other members of the bar for inclusion in the 100 Top Lawyers in the entire state (Joseph Ahmad) by Texas Monthly magazine, and among the "Best Lawyers in America" (Joseph Ahmad and John Zavitsanos), an achievement limited to less than 1% of all practicing lawyers.