In January 2019, Diana Bronshteyn, whom a doctor had diagnosed with fibromyalgia, sued the California Department of Consumer Affairs under the California Fair Employment and Housing Act, section 12900 et seq. She sued for failure to accommodate, failure to engage in an interactive process, disability discrimination, and failure to prevent discrimination.

The case was a long shot. Jean Hyams, one of Bronshteyn’s lead attorneys, admitted to a “significant risk that the jury might be swayed by the fact that the [Department] permitted [Bronshteyn] to take a long leave of absence and, on paper at least, offered her all of the accommodations she had previously requested.” From her work in disability rights, Hyams was aware that “women with fibromyalgia are often stigmatized and stereotyped as exaggerating or making up their symptoms.” Hyams also conceded the doctor’s notes Bronshteyn relied on in requesting leave were “ambiguous,” which compounded the risk in taking the case.

The Department fought the case hard from the start. The Department refused to discuss settlement. Many of plaintiff’s motions were unsuccessfully opposed. The Department moved for summary adjudication. The court denied the motion in July 2021. Discovery was contentious. Both sides propounded multiple sets of written discovery requests, and both sides filed multiple ex parte applications and motions to compel further responses and documents.

In June 2022, Bronshteyn made a Code of Civil Procedure section 998 offer to compromise for $600,000 and for reasonable attorneys’ fees and costs. The Department rejected the section 998 offer and did not counter.

Trial by jury went for six weeks in the summer of 2022. It too was contentious. The jury found for Bronshteyn on all counts. Its verdict was $3,324,262 in damages. This sum is more than five times greater than Bronshteyn’s section 998 offer. The Department filed a motion for judgment notwithstanding the verdict. The court denied the motion. The Department moved for a new trial. The court denied the motion. The Department appealed the verdict. It lost. (See Bronshteyn v. Dept. of Consumer Affairs (May 12, 2025, B325678) [nonpub. opn.] (Bronshteyn I).) This was in 2025. By now the case was more than six years old.

Bronshteyn moved for statutory attorney fees and costs as the prevailing party under the Act, pursuant to section 12965, subdivision (c)(6). Her counsel requested a lodestar amount of $2,987,583.11, reflecting the number of hours they worked on the case, multiplied by the requested hourly rates: $1,000 for Wendy Musell; $1,100 for Jean Hyams; $1,200 for Leslie Levy; $1,100 for Sharon Vinick; $1,050 for Darci Burrell; $900 for Maraka Willits; $425 for Brittany Wightman; $350 for bar-certified law students; and $225 for paralegal and legal assistants.

Bronshteyn’s attorneys noted they had put more than 3000 hours into the case. They submitted contemporaneous and precise timesheets recorded in six-minute intervals, with breakdowns by day and person. They also filed detailed declarations describing their litigation backgrounds, past fee awards, the work on Bronshteyn’s case, the division of labor, and their efforts to limit duplication. Counsel voluntarily applied a five percent reduction to account for clerical work and travel time.

There was a contentious battle between the parties over the amount attorney fees. At the end of the day, the total fee award was $4,889,786.03. In justifying its decision to award rates at the higher end of Los Angeles rates, the court noted: “[t]he quality of lawyering was high; far beyond what the court would expect of an average lawyer – even with the years of experience the lawyers here exhibited.”

The Department appealed (again). The court of appeal affirmed the trial court award of attorney fees in the published case of Bronshteyn v. Dept. of Consumer Affairs -B329890 (Sept 2025).

In affirming the trial court, the opinion noted “In this second appeal, the Department argues the trial court abused its discretion in awarding $4,889,786.03 in attorney fees to Bronshteyn’s counsel. As the trial court aptly observed: ‘[t]he fact that [the Department] did not settle the case early might or might not be good litigation strategy or bad litigation strategy . . . But the biggest thing it does is it makes it hard for [the Department] to claim that [Bronshteyn] shouldn’t have spent money litigating to try the case, which is reflected in the number of hours that [counsel] billed.’ ”

“We affirm the trial court’s careful and well-reasoned ruling.”

California to Pay $3.3M in FEHA Damages + $4.9M Attorney Fees