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Mercer Legal Group represents Los Angeles and California employees terminated for reasons California law protects — discrimination, retaliation, protected leave, whistleblowing, or refusing to break the law. We take cases across Los Angeles County, from downtown and the San Fernando Valley to Long Beach and Pasadena, along with employees anywhere in the state who lost a job for a reason the law does not allow. Not every firing is illegal, but some are. If you have been searching for a wrongful termination attorney near you since losing your job, one conversation is usually enough to place your situation on the right side of that line. We can tell you which one yours is.
Wrongful termination in California means you were fired for a reason the law forbids, not just a reason that felt unfair. California is an at-will state under Labor Code §2922, so an employer can usually fire you for almost any reason. The exceptions are what matter: a firing tied to a protected trait under FEHA (Gov. Code §12940), or to protected activity like whistleblowing under Labor Code §1102.5, crosses into wrongful termination. Drawing that line is the first thing a California wrongful termination lawyer does when reviewing your facts.
The legal test is not whether the firing was fair. It is whether it was tied to a protected characteristic — race, gender, age 40 or older, disability, religion, national origin, pregnancy, sexual orientation, or gender identity — or to a protected activity, such as reporting discrimination or harassment, requesting an accommodation, taking medical or family leave, reporting illegal conduct, or refusing to do something illegal. If yes, you may have a case. Plenty of Los Angeles employees come to us unsure which category fits, and pinning that down is exactly what a free case review is for. If the answer is genuinely no, an attorney will tell you that on the first call.
Mercer Legal Group reviews employment law claims carefully, explains available options, and pursues appropriate remedies when the facts and law support them. Every case is different, and no attorney can guarantee a specific result.
Our California wrongful termination attorneys read the facts, explain whether your firing fits a recognized wrongful-termination category, file the right administrative charge or civil claim, and pursue available remedies when the facts support them. People come to us from across Los Angeles and throughout California, and every case starts the same way. From the first call you talk to a senior attorney. Cases are handled on a contingency-fee basis — no upfront cost to bring a claim.
If you were fired and are not sure whether the firing was legal, the procedural questions matter as much as the legal ones. Most reach us from people across Los Angeles still weighing whether to call a wrongful termination attorney at all. Below are the questions clients ask us most.
California gives wrongful termination plaintiffs more room than federal law. Performance reasons can be pretext when the documented record does not support them — when reviews were strong until shortly before termination, when the alleged misconduct was inconsistently disciplined, or when comparator coworkers committed the same conduct without termination. Los Angeles juries respond strongly to pretext evidence built from the employer’s own HR file. A wrongful termination lawyer usually starts there and reads the personnel file for the gaps between what the employer wrote and what it later claimed.
It can be. California treats close temporal proximity between a protected complaint and termination as strong evidence of retaliation under FEHA and Labor Code §1102.5. Los Angeles courts examine the employer’s documented reasoning, comparator treatment, and whether the stated termination reason existed before the complaint. If your firing landed within days or weeks of a complaint, that timing is worth walking through with a California wrongful termination attorney.
Strong protection under California law. Under the Tameny doctrine and Labor Code §1102.5, California treats firing an employee for refusing to commit an illegal act, or for reporting illegal conduct, as wrongful termination in violation of public policy. Los Angeles cases under §1102.5 can be filed directly in court without administrative exhaustion. That is a meaningful edge, and a local wrongful termination lawyer can tell you whether your report qualifies.
Maybe yes. California severance releases must meet specific requirements — clear language, adequate consideration, knowing and voluntary execution, and special disclosures for age claims under OWBPA. Many California employer releases fail one or more of these requirements. Have a California employment attorney review the release before assuming the claim is lost. A short review with a wrongful termination lawyer often costs you nothing and can surface a claim you thought you had signed away.
It depends on the legal basis. FEHA-based wrongful termination claims (discrimination, retaliation) have three years to file with the California Civil Rights Department (CRD). Labor Code §1102.5 whistleblower claims have three years and can be filed directly in court. Tameny common-law wrongful termination claims have two years from the termination date. Because these clocks differ, checking your date with a California wrongful termination attorney early keeps the shortest one from quietly running out.
If you were fired and you believe the firing was tied to discrimination, retaliation, protected leave, whistleblowing, or refusing to break the law, contact Mercer Legal Group for a free, confidential case review with a Los Angeles wrongful termination lawyer. Whether you are in the city, the Valley, or elsewhere in California, the review costs nothing and puts a straight answer in front of you. Contacting us does not create an attorney-client relationship.
