Debra Lynn Reilly

Debra Reilly received her J.D. in 1989 from the University of San Diego School of Law, where she was an Editor for the San Diego Law Review in 1988-89; she authored a law review article titled Reversal of a RICO Predicate Offense on Appeal: Should the RICO Count Be Vacated?, which is published in Volume 27, Issue 1, of the San Diego Law Review. She was also a Finalist in a San Diego School of Law Moot Court competition.

After graduation, Ms. Reilly worked as an Extern Law Clerk for Justice David R. Thompson of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals before joining the Orange County-based law firm Murtaugh Miller Meyer & Nelson LLP from 1990 to 1999, where she became a partner practicing employment law on behalf of employers and management, which included the performance of workplace investigations. In 1999, Ms. Reilly moved to San Diego to serve for one year as the Research Attorney to United States District Judge Larry A. Burns of the United States District Court, Southern District of California. In that capacity, she researched and drafted proposed judicial opinions and court orders and conducted discovery conferences with counsel of record on court cases involving the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Civil Rights Act of 1871 (42 U.S.C. § 1983), Copyright/Patent Infringement, Social Security Appeals, Federal Tort Claims Act, and Writs of Habeas Corpus.

Ms. Reilly then joined a Mission Viejo law firm as a partner for three years heading up the firm’s employment law department before eventually opening her own employment law practice in 2002. In Ms. Reilly’s representation of public entities, corporations, management, and employees, she has handled all facets of employment litigation, including trial work. She has handled numerous administrative proceedings before the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing, the California Labor Commission’s Division of Labor Standards Enforcement, the Employment Development Department, and the City of Santa Ana Personnel Board.

Ms. Reilly has been conducting internal workplace investigations since 1994 throughout California and now does it fulltime. Throughout her legal career, she has conducted over 900 investigations for numerous municipalities, counties, water and sanitation districts, vector control districts, fire departments, police departments, public and private universities, community college districts, public and private school districts (elementary and secondary), transportation authorities, the United States Postal Service (holding a “sensitive” security clearance by the Postal Inspector’s Office), and many private sector employers (including several Fortune 500 companies). Given Ms. Reilly’s experience in conducting police and fire department investigations, she is well versed in providing the appropriate pre-interview notices and admonitions pursuant to the Public Safety Officers Procedural Bill of Rights Act, the Firefighters Procedural Bill of Rights Act, and Lybarger Admonitions.

Types of Investigations Handled By Debra Reilly

• Waste and abuse in government contracts
• Violation of contract procurement policies; contract splitting to avoid threshold of Board scrutiny; violation of competitive bidding laws (Public Contract Code)
• Misuse and abuse of public funds, gift of public funds, credit card misuse
• Misuse of public vehicle, travel expense abuse, expense reimbursement fraud
• Employee violations of Penal Code 424 (misappropriation of public funds), Penal Code 72 (presenting false claim to Public Board or Officer), Government Code 8314 (private person’s use of public resources)
• Violations of code of ethics, violation of conflict of interest policies
• Unauthorized, improper use of public property, equipment, or funds for private purposes; improper use of authority for personal gain
• Bribery or the receiving of or the giving of other unlawful gifts or gratuities Falsification of time cards
• Counterfeiting of tennis passes to high-level tennis tournament
• Wage & Hour investigations
• Harassment, Discrimination, Retaliation based on FEHA, Title VII, ADA, Rehabilitation Act, ADEA, California Code of Regulations “Title V” (sex, race, color, age, ethnicity, pregnancy, disability, religion/creed, national origin, marital status, etc.)
• Sexual assault/battery
• First Amendment/freedom of expression issues
• Reasonable Accommodation of Disabilities / Failure to Engage in Interactive Process
• California Whistleblower Statute (Calif. Labor Code )

Testimony

Ms. Reilly has testified in deposition, arbitration, and jury trials concerning the findings of her own internal investigations, all of which have been upheld by the triers of fact (arbitrators and juries). She has qualified, and testified, as an expert witness concerning “standard practices” in conducting internal investigations involving employee misconduct, harassment, discrimination, and retaliation, as well as appropriate billing practices of investigators.

Publications, Presentations, Professional Memberships

Ms. Reilly has published numerous articles on employment law and internal workplace investigations. She has presented numerous educational seminars and webinars sponsored by the State Bar of California, the Association of Workplace Investigators, the Orange County Bar Association, the San Diego County Bar Association, the Society of Human Resources Management San Diego (SHRM-San Diego), the San Diego Employers Association Roundtable, and , on how to conduct thorough workplace investigations.

Ms. Reilly is a member of the California State Bar (Labor and Employment Law section), the San Diego County Bar Association (Labor and Employment Law section), the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners, the Society of Human Resources Management (“SHRM”), the San Diego Chapter of the Society of Human Resources Management, the Association of Title IX Administrators, Orange County Bar Association (Labor and Employment Law section), and a past member of the North County Personnel Association of San Diego.

Ms. Reilly is a founding Board Member of the Association of Workplace Investigators (“AWI”), where she served on the Board for six years, and she served as the Chair of its Publications Committee and Editor-in-Chief of The AWI Journal from 2009 through March 2013. Since March 2013, she has been the Vice-Chair of the AWI Publications Committee, and continues to be an Editor and a continuing author of publications within The AWI Journal. She served as the Vice-Chair of the Webinars/Seminars Committee of AWI from November 2014 to December 2015, and she was a member of the Guiding Principles Committee of AWI from June 2014 to December 2015.

Since January 2010, Ms. Reilly has been certified as a Senior Professional in Human Resources (“SPHR”) by the Human Resources Certification Institute. She also received a Certificate of Attendance (40-Hours) from the National Training Institute of the Association of Workplace Investigators in June 2012. She was a full-time faculty member at the weeklong National Training Institute of the Association of Workplace Investigators in February 2015 in Sonoma, CA, where she presented modules on Public Sector Investigations and Making Credibility Determinations.