Christopher W. Deering,  Principal of Vulcan Employment Law

 

Mr. Deering has extensive experience representing employers in successfully avoiding and defending a broad range of employment-related claims. His focus areas include employment discrimination, wrongful discharge, retaliation and harassment, whistleblower issues, restrictive covenants, wage-hour matters (including class and collective actions) and workplace safety.  Mr. Deering has litigated such matters throughout Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Mississippi, Tennessee, and Texas.

 

In addition, Mr. Deering regularly provides counseling to employers on matters of employee discipline and termination, enforcement and implementation of employment policies, workplace investigations, and reductions in force.  He has written extensively on issues in the labor and employment law field, and has been a regular contributing chapter editor of Employment Discrimination Law, The Developing Labor Law, The Fair Labor Standards Act, and The Family & Medical Leave Act (BNA Books), the principal treatises devoted to labor and employment law issues in the United States.

 

Mr. Deering is recognized as one of the nation’s top labor and employment attorneys in the annual U.S. News & World Report’s Best Lawyers in America (2013-present) and Mid-South SuperLawyer ratings for Employment Litigation (2014-present).  He graduated magna cum laude from the Cumberland School of Law (Samford University).  While in law school, he served as the Editor-in-Chief of the Cumberland Law Review, was a judge on the Moot Court Board, and was selected as a Cordell Hull Fellow. He is also a member of Curia Honoris, Phi Delta Phi, and Omicron Delta Kappa leadership honorary, and is a charter member of the Birmingham Inn of the American Inns of Court.

 

Anecdotal Experience

• Successfully represented clients in numerous FLSA (wage & hour) collective actions.

• Won summary judgment in numerous discrimination, harassment and retaliation cases under federal and state law for clients in many business industries, including manufacturing, construction, healthcare, retail, hospitality, utility, education, transportation, among others.

• Successfully upheld the enforcement of a restrictive covenant at the Alabama Supreme Court.

• Successfully defended multi-plaintiff sexual harassment and race discrimination cases.

• Successfully secured a TRO against a client’s competitor under the Alabama Trade Secrets Act.

• Successfully represented clients in preliminary injunction hearings and cases involving business competition and trade secrets.

• Successfully defended employer-clients in OSHA catastrophe and fatality investigations, as well as OSHA citation contests.

• Sustained claim of pre-emption of Alabama retaliatory discharge claim under Section 301 of the Labor Management Relations Act.

• Qui tam and retaliation claim representation of government contractor under federal False Claims Act.

• Successfully defended employers in multiple whistleblower cases under various federal statutes

 

Education

Juris Doctor, magna cum laude, Cumberland School of Law at Samford University 

Bachelor of Arts, Samford University

 

Admittance to Practice

State of Alabama

State of Florida

District of Columbia

U.S. Court of Appeals, Eleventh and District of Columbia Circuits

U.S. District Court, Middle, Northern and Southern Districts of Alabama

U.S. District Court, Middle, Northern and Southern Districts of Florida

U.S. District Court, Eastern and Northern Districts of Texas