Lecturer Bios
Andrew W. Singer, Esq.
Andrew W. Singer leads Tannenbaum Helpern's Employment Law Practice Group, which offers a full spectrum of legal services from everyday counseling to complex employment litigation. With extensive experience in all aspects of employment law, he regularly advises companies with various human resource and compliance issues:
Employment
- draft and negotiate employment agreements and executive compensation structures
- draft non-competition, non-solicit and confidentiality agreements
- counsel companies on restrictive covenant enforceability
- draft and negotiate severance agreements
Regulation/Compliance
- wage and hour compliance, including overtime computation and exemptions from overtime, minimum wage, payment and deduction from wages, commissions and draw structures, bonus and incentive compensation, governmental wage and hour audits, recordkeeping, and federal and state labor laws
- independent contractors, misclassification analyses, consulting agreements, and governmental audits
- privacy concerns, including federal and state workplace privacy laws, off-duty conduct laws, drug-testing, and background and credit-checks
HR Policies
- social media policies and technology and e-mail usage policies
- anti-discrimination, including sexual harassment, retaliation, accommodating the disabled and religion, and handling internal corporate investigations
- employee termination, WARN Act compliance, and COBRA
- human resource and compliance counseling, including drafting and reviewing employee handbooks, drafting job descriptions, vacation and PTO policies, family and medical leave compliance, military leave policies, and issues related to employment applications
Litigation & Dispute Resolution
- defend discrimination and retaliation claims based upon sex, race, sexual orientation, national origin, religion, disability, age and any other protected class in federal and state courts
- handle discrimination matters filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, the New York State Division of Human Rights, and the New York City Commission on Human Rights
A frequent speaker on employment law topics and emerging trends, Andrew regularly conducts training seminars for supervisory and managerial employees covering equal employment laws and sexual harassment, the Americans with Disabilities Act, wage and hour laws, independent contractor misclassification, workplace violence, social media policies, the Family and Medical Leave Act and other leave policies, workforce reduction and the WARN Act, and other employment law developments.
Andrew has been selected for inclusion in New York Super Lawyers for 2010, 2011, 2012 and 2013.
Vincent J. Syracuse, Esq.
Vincent J. Syracuse joined Tannenbaum Helpern during the summer of 1979 and founded the firm's litigation department and is currently its Chair. As a general litigator for over 40 years, Vince has earned a reputation as a problem-solver, strategizer, tactician and aggressive advocate for his clients. Recognized by Super Lawyers as one of the Top 100 Lawyers in the New York Metro area, he represents a variety of clients in commercial litigation in all New York State and Federal Courts on the pre-trial, trial and appellate levels and in various alternate dispute resolution forums including mediation and arbitration. He is also a mediator in the Commercial Division of the New York County Supreme Court.
Vince has been active for many years in numerous bar association activities and frequently chairs or participates as a faculty member in continuing legal education programs on various commercial litigation subjects, including the New York State Bar Association's extremely successful program on ethics and civility in litigation which he has chaired for over fourteen years. Vince has been a member of the NYSBA's House of Delegates. He has been a member of the Executive Committee of the NYSBA's Commercial and Federal Litigation Section since 1994. He was the Section's Chair in 2009-2010, having previously served as Chair-Elect, Vice-Chair and three terms as the Section's Treasurer. The Section honored Vince with its nominations in 2007 and 2012 for the NYSBA's Attorney Professionalism Award recognizing him as a "tireless advocate for ethics and civility in New York." In March 2010, Vince was appointed by Chief Judge Jonathan Lippman to the Ethics Commission for the Unified Court System which monitors the annual financial disclosure statements within the judicial branch of the New York State government. Vince is also a member of the NYSBA's Committees on Attorney Professionalism and Continuing Legal Education. He writes the monthly Attorney Professionalism Forum in the NYSBA Journal.
As a member of the Advisory Committee for the Commercial Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York and a former Chair of the Commercial Division Committee, Vince has helped shape the development of the Commercial Division since its inception in New York and Monroe Counties, and subsequent expansion to several counties throughout the State of New York. The Advisory Committee acts as liaison between the bar and the Commercial Division and has created a mechanism that allows practitioners in the Commercial Division to express their views about the structure of the Commercial Division, and comment on various matters of Commercial Division practice, including the definition of a "commercial case." Vince has been directly involved in the drafting of the Commercial Division rules that have refined the criteria for the assignment and retention of cases in the Commercial Division, and govern practice in the various Commercial Division venues.
Vince has been selected for inclusion in New York Super Lawyers for 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, and 2014 every year that selections were made.
Jamie B. W. Stecher, Esq.
Jamie Stecher's practice consists of a wide range of business-related litigation and counseling matters involving: contracts, such as stock purchase agreements, employment agreements, and other business arrangements; business torts; trade secrets; and trust and estate litigation. He regularly appears in state and federal trial and appellate courts in New York, and various arbitral and other ADR forums. He has handled litigations throughout the United States, and has consulted on litigations and arbitrations in foreign countries.
Jamie's most significant representations include: an international battle (in Stockholm, London, New York and Houston) over the enforcement of an international arbitration award against a Russian oil company; obtaining specific performance of a contract to purchase a collection of rare violins, and then obtaining substantial monetary sanctions against the defendant and her attorney (Southern District of New York and Second Circuit); serving as appellate counsel and securing the reversal of a multi-million dollar indemnification award arising from a major corporate transaction (Appellate Division, First Department); several successful dealer termination litigations; and recovering millions of dollars from corporate officers who had violated duties of trust and loyalty (various courts in New York and New Jersey).
Jamie has been selected for inclusion in New York Super Lawyers for 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013 and 2014 and for inclusion in ALM's New York Area's Top Rated Lawyers for 2012.
Paul D. Sarkozi, Esq.
Recognized by Super Lawyers in the New York Times as one of the Top 100 Lawyers in the New York Metro area, Paul Sarkozi is a savvy litigator and negotiator who focuses on results for his clients. Equally adept in federal and state court, Paul has nonetheless developed a particularly strong reputation in New York's Commercial Division, the branch of the NY Court system that handles complex business disputes. He was selected by NY Chief Judge Jonathan Lippman to serve on his Task Force on Commercial Litigation in the 21st Century and serves on the Chief Judge's Commercial Division Advisory Council as Co-Chair of the Alternative Dispute Resolution Committee. Paul also serves as Chair of the State Bar's Commercial and Federal Litigation Section, which regularly addresses critical issue affecting business litigation in both NY State and Federal courts.
A versatile advocate, Paul is called on by business entities and senior executives in a broad range of industries to counsel them on the best ways to prosecute, defend and resolve their disputes. He has represented hedge funds, private equity firms, REITs and developers, global media and public relations firms, a leading athletic clothing designer, international banking organizations, international pharmaceutical and food companies, a national accounting firm and even a Saudi prince.
Finally, Paul is an experienced, smart and effective negotiator. His knowledge and skill in this area have been recognized by Columbia Law School, where he has been appointed a Lecturer-in-Law to teach a Negotiation seminar. Paul also serves on the roster of mediators for the Commercial Division in New York County.
