Sokoloff Stern LLP

Brian S. Sokoloff

Brian S. Sokoloff attended Brooklyn Law School, graduating cum laude in 1986. He was admitted to the bar in New York State in 1987, and is admitted to the following federal courts: United States District Courts for the Southern, Eastern, Northern and Western Districts of New York; the Second Circuit, and the United States Supreme Court. He has been admitted pro hac vice in cases in Washington, D.C. and California.

Mr. Sokoloff’s broad-based litigation experience spans his entire legal career, often with a focus on difficult federal and constitutional issues. From 1986 to 1989, Brian was an Assistant Corporation Counsel in the General Litigation Division of the New York City Law Department. The division represented the City of New York, its agencies, and employees, inter alia, in their role as employer and service provider. Routinely, Mr. Sokoloff litigated and tried cases of employment discrimination. Illustrative of Mr. Sokoloff’s experience handling discrimination matters for the City are: Serrapica v. City of New York, 708 F. Supp. 64 (S.D.N.Y), aff’d, 888 F.2d 126 (2nd Cir. 1989) and Sattler v. New York City Commission on Human Rights, 147 Misc.2d 189, 554 N.Y.S.2d 763 (Sup. Ct. Westchester Co.), aff’d 180 A.D.2d 644, 580 N.Y.S.2d 35 (2nd Dep’t 1990). The Serrapica case, which Mr. Sokoloff tried to a defense verdict, was a challenge, under the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 (predecessor to the Americans with Disabilities Act), by a medically disqualified uncontrolled diabetic to the medical standards that barred uncontrolled diabetics from the job of sanitation worker. Plaintiff claimed the standards represented unjustified discrimination against handicapped individuals. The trial involved extensive expert testimony. Sattler, a landmark case at the time, was a challenge by a dentist to a finding by the New York City Commission on Human Rights that he discriminated against an AIDS patient in a public accommodation by refusing to treat him.

In Berkovich v. Hicks, a federal case, Mr. Sokoloff obtained a defense verdict in a very difficult case that foreshadowed the Abner Louima case. In Berkovich, plaintiff, a white arrestee with Polaroid photos of his wounds, claimed that he was slashed repeatedly in the bathroom of a Brooklyn police precinct by a black police officer. The case is reported on appeal at 922 F.2d 1018 (2nd Cir. 1991), and has attained somewhat of a landmark status for some of the discovery issues it involved.

In many unreported decisions, Mr. Sokoloff litigated cases involving employment discrimination, police misconduct, election law, education law, and other high profile matters.

For nearly eight years, Mr. Sokoloff was affiliated with the law firm of Thurm & Heller, LLP, the last two years as a partner. The bulk of Mr. Sokoloff’s practice found him representing employers and municipalities sued for employment discrimination, police misconduct, land use decisions, and other civil rights violations, such as First Amendment retaliation. While at Thurm & Heller, Mr. Sokoloff litigated and successfully tried large, politically sensitive civil rights cases in federal court, such as LeBlanc-Sternberg v. Fletcher, 846 F. Supp. 294 (S.D.N.Y. 1994) and DLC v. Town of Hyde Park (unreported at the trial stage, but reported on appeal at 163 F.3d 124). The Sternberg case, about which Mr. Sokoloff wrote a front-page analysis for the New York Law Journal on January 6, 1994, was a challenge by Orthodox Jews and the United States Department of Justice to the establishment of the Village of Airmont in Rockland County on the ground that the Village was formed in order to deny Orthodox Jews their First Amendment right to the free exercise of religion and their rights under the Fair Housing Act. The DLC case was a challenge by a landowner and a developer to Hyde Park’s rezoning of land for the alleged purpose of scuttling the proposed development of a Walmart shopping center across the street from the FDR home and library in Hyde Park. Both Sternberg and DLC lasted several years, and took weeks to try successfully.

Mr. Sokoloff has successfully handled every stripe of employment discrimination case, including First Amendment retaliation claims, race discrimination, sexual harassment, sexual orientation discrimination, age discrimination, pregnancy discrimination, whistleblower claims, and Equal Pay Act claims, among others.

In 1998, Mr. Sokoloff helped found Miranda & Sokoloff, which later became Miranda Sokoloff Sambursky Slone Verveniotis LLP. While there, Mr. Sokoloff continued his zealous advocacy for insurers and non-insurers alike.

In 2001, Mr. Sokoloff obtained a defense verdict in Fiorante v. Connetquot School District, CV-99-2710 (DRH), a two-week-plus jury trial in federal court on Long Island. In that case, plaintiff, a former employee with a history of back problems, raised unique claims under the anti-retaliation provision of the Americans with Disabilities Act.

In 2002, Mr. Sokoloff obtained summary judgment for the City of White Plains in Hi Pockets, Inc. v. Westchester Conservatory of Music, 192 F.Supp.2d 143 (S.D.N.Y. 2002), a case in which a property owner claimed that the City violated its rights in the granting of a building permit to a neighbor.

In 2002, Mr. Sokoloff obtained a defense verdict before a jury in Poyau v. Dance Theater of Harlem, an employment case brought by the former Chief Director of Administration. Mr. Sokoloff successfully represented the Dance Theater and its famed creator, Arthur Mitchell.

In Moran v. City of New Rochelle, Mr. Sokoloff tried to a defense verdict in federal court in White Plains an equal protection challenge to the City’s farm animal ordinance. Plaintiffs sued the City, its Corporation Counsel, and other officials, claiming that the City targeted them by enacting the law and enforced the law unequally with regard to their two horses.

In Rolon v. Henneman, 517 F.3d 140 (2^nd Cir. 2008), Mr. Sokoloff convinced a U.S. District Court and then the Second Circuit that a municipal employee has no right to sue his supervisor under federal law for the supervisor’s efforts to secure disciplinary charges against his subordinate.

In Donovan v. Village of Malverne, Mr. Sokoloff first obtained partial summary judgment and then a defense verdict in a First Amendment federal case where a police officer claimed that he was repeatedly denied promotion to the rank of sergeant because of his union activities and in retaliation for his campaigning for an opposition candidate in a recent Village election.

In Scott v. City of New Rochelle, Mr. Sokoloff was asked to try the damages portion of a bifurcated personal injury action on behalf of the City. A previous jury had already found the City 50% at fault for an accident involving a sanitation truck. Plaintiff called experts to testify that he sustained herniated disks in his back and neck, a broken nose, and post-concussion syndrome as a result of the accident. The jury returned a verdict of $2,000 ($500 medical expenses and $1,500 pain and suffering), which was reduced, because of plaintiff’s contributory negligence to $1,000.

Mr. Sokoloff has lectured at seminars on employment discrimination and civil rights, among other places, to Town Attorneys at the New York State Association of Towns meeting in New York City, the annual meeting of the New York State Conference of Mayors, and the Suffolk County Bar Association.