Have you been terminated by your California employer? Are you wondering if your California termination was unlawful or would amount to a wrongful termination? If you are asking these questions you are probably wondering what type of lawyer you need to hire for a California wrongful termination case and how does the process work.
First, not all lawyers handle labor and employment matters or wrongful termination claims. Not all lawyers represent employees. Your first step should be to find a lawyer in your area that handles wrongful termination and represents mainly employees. If you do a simple search on Google for "wrongful termination" in the county in which you live like San Bernardino or Riverside you will find a list of lawyers that have either paid for their ads to be displayed or you find a list of lawyers in the Google places area right below the paid ads. I would start with the lawyers local to you first. They may be more familiar with the court in your county and may have some understanding about local employers or may have even litigated against them in the past.
Second, i would call a couple of the lawyers from the list and ask for a consultation. Most if not all wrongful termination lawyers will offer a FREE phone consultation or in-person consultation. During this consultation the prospective lawyer will screen your case to determine whether it is a matter that they are willing to accept.
Third, assuming it is a case they are willing to accept then you will next discuss the retainer agreement and how the lawyer will be paid. In most cases, if your matter involves wrongful termination, sexual harassment, and or discrimination of some variety the lawyer will probably take your case on a contingency,which means that the lawyer and the law firm will receive a percentage of the actual recovery you receive. In some cases where contingency is not an option the employment lawyer may accept your case on a traditional retainer, which means the client pays by the hour.
This is a very basic road map to finding representation in your wrongful termination matter but it should get most potential clients searching in the right direction.