Experience

Schwartz Perry & Heller LLP

• United States
• Legal Services
• 1 - 100 Employee

• Managing Attorney

  • Jul 1991 - Present

• Partner

  • Jan 1994 - Nov 2016

  Davida S. Perry has been litigating since her admission to the bar in 1986. Ms. Perry is "AV" rated with Preeminence by Martindale-Hubbell. In 1994, Ms. Perry and her father, Murray Schwartz, created the partnership of Schwartz & Perry LLP, now known as Schwartz Perry & Heller, a firm devoted exclusively toward representing victims of employment discrimination, including sexual harassment. Ms. Perry worked on the landmark case of Thoreson v. Penthouse Magazine. The Thoreson case was significant because the Court found that a claim of sexual harassment could be proven based only on the victim's testimony.In 1991, the City of New York enacted its own Human Rights Law, which allowed broad relief to a victim of employment discrimination working in the City. The constitutionality of the City law was challenged in Bracker v. Cohen, a sexual harassment case handled by Schwartz & Perry. Ms. Perry was involved in all phases of the case including the appellate process. The New York City Human Rights Law was ultimately found to be constitutional and, as a result, a multitude of cases have been instituted under that law.Notably, Ms. Perry participated in the trial of McIntyre v. Manhattan Ford, a sexual harassment and retaliation case. A Manhattan jury awarded Ms. McIntyre $6.6 million, which, even after being reduced by the trial and appellate court, still remains one of the highest verdicts awarded to a sexual harassment victim in the entire nation.In June 2006, Ms. Perry was involved in a two-week trial in a retaliation case stemming from an allegation of age discrimination in which the the jury returned a verdict in the amount of $2.5 million, of which $300,000 was an award for punitive damages. The verdict, an attorney's fee award plus interest resulted in a final judgment that totaled nearly $4 million.In 2014, Ms. Perry participated in the trial of Rivera v. United Parcel Service, a sexual harassment case in which the jury awarded the Plaintiff $1.33 million. Show less



Law Offices of Murray Schwartz

• Associate

  • Jul 1991 - Jan 1994