As gamemaker Activision Blizzard is embroiled in controversy and legal backlash, the situation surrounding one of the industry’s biggest companies continues to unfold.

The company is currently in the middle of a discrimination lawsuit filed by the state of California, and that case has now taken an unexpected turn. A lawyer for the state of California has announced that she is resigning from her position, citing interference from governor Gavin Newsom as the reason.

The story in the Wall Street Journal claims Newsom’s office fired a lawyer involved in the workplace-misconduct lawsuit against videogame company Activision Blizzard Inc., prompting a second attorney to quit in protest, according to a lawyer representing both attorneys.

The California Department of Fair Employment and Housing Chief Counsel Janette Wipper was told by Mr. Newsom’s office on March 29 that she was being fired, according to a statement from Alexis Ronickher, Ms. Wipper’s attorney. Ms. Wipper’s last day at the department was Wednesday and she is evaluating her legal avenues, including a claim under the California Whistleblower Protection Act, the statement said.

Bloomberg reported Melanie Proctor, assistant chief counsel with California’s Department of Fair Employment and Housing, told staff in a Tuesday email she was resigning in protest over the firing of Janette Wipper, the department’s chief counsel who worked on the Activision lawsuit. Proctor also said Newsom’s office asked for “advance notice” on elements of the litigation.

“As we continued to win in state court, this interference increased, mimicking the interests of Activision’s counsel,” the email said, according to Bloomberg.

Newsom’s spokeswoman Erin Mellon said claims of interference by the governor’s office “are categorically false.”  No other details about Newsom’s alleged interference have been made public. Activision spokesman Rich George did not immediately respond to an email Thursday.

However in a related story, Politico reports that a board member for Activision donated $100,000 to a campaign to stop the 2021 recall of Gov. Gavin Newsom, according to state records

Casey Wasserman, CEO of the Wasserman Media Group, is a director at Activision Blizzard, according to the company’s website, and sits on the board of directors and the board’s nominating and corporate governance committee. Just weeks after the California DFEH filed the July suit against the company, alleging rampant sexual harassment and discrimination against women, Wasserman donated $100,000 to the Stop the Republican Recall of Governor Newsom campaign, according to campaign finance records.

The Activision suit – filed in July 2021 in Los Angeles – comes after two years of investigation conducted by the DFEH. It accuses the “Call of Duty” maker of fostering a “pervasive frat boy” culture where women are paid less for the same jobs that men perform, regularly face sexual harassment, and are targeted for reporting issues. In particular, the suit claims that female employees face “constant sexual harassment,” from “having to continually fend off unwanted sexual comments” to “being groped.” When employees report issues to human resources and management, the suit says, no action is taken.

Activision has refuted many of the suit’s claims and said it has cooperated with the DFEH’s investigation.

Within a couple months of the California agency filing its original suit, the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission filed its own lawsuit against Activision Blizzard, and agreed to settle it the same day. In March, the company agreed to an $18 million settlement with the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission over similar harassment and discrimination allegations.

The DFEH objected to the settlement and its small $18 million fund set up for “eligible claimants.” Among the reasons for the objection were that the settlement involved anyone receiving a portion of that $18 million to sign a waiver giving up their right to collect any other restitution over wrongdoings by Activision.

The DFEH also objected to the settlement arguing that it essentially ordered tampering of evidence relevant to its own case. The original proposed settlement required Activision Blizzard to “remove from the personnel files of each Eligible Claimant any references to the allegations related to sexual harassment, pregnancy discrimination, and/or related retaliation” and reclassify the terminations of anyone fired in retaliation as voluntary resignations.

In return, the federal EEOC accused the state agency of ethics violations because two of the DFEH attorneys looking to give Activision Blizzard more than a slap on the wrist previously had senior roles in the EEOC and led the investigation that resulted in its own lawsuit.

In January 2022, Microsoft announced intentions to buy Activision for an estimated $68.7 billion in an all-cash deal. The Seattle computing giant is expected to inherit the DFEH lawsuit should the deal pass regulation and close later this year.

The Legislature passed a law, which became effective on January 1, 2022, requiring the California State Auditor’s Office to conduct an audit of the State Bar’s attorney complaint and discipline process. The Legislature included this requirement in the law because the State Bar did not take action against Los Angeles lawyer Tomas Girardi, husband of “Real Housewives of Beverly Hills” star Erika Jayne, for misconduct until recently, despite repeated allegations of this attorney’s misconduct over decades.

The prequel to the State Auditor’s report that was just published, was a Los Angeles Times investigation that documented how the now-disgraced attorney Tom Girardi cultivated close relationships with the agency and kept an unblemished law license despite over 100 lawsuits against him or his firm – with many alleging misappropriation of client money. Along with his family and employees, Girardi contributed more than $7.3 million to political candidates.

In months of interviews and reviews of documents, the Times found that Girardi cultivated close relationships with bar officials that at times appeared improper. Agency staffers received annual invitations to a Las Vegas legal conference, where Girardi hosted over-the-top parties at the Wynn casino featuring Jay Leno and other celebrity entertainers.

While under investigation for misconduct in 2010, Girardi bankrolled a lavish retirement bash for the chief justice of the state Supreme Court, which oversees the bar, even booking crooner Paul Anka to perform, according to news reports, court records and interviews with attendees.

He forged a particularly tight relationship with a bar investigator named Tom Layton. Over the decade and a half Layton worked at the bar, Girardi routinely treated him to pricey meals at the Jonathan Club, Morton’s and the Palm, according to Layton’s sworn testimony. The investigator rode on Girardi’s private jet and two of his children got jobs at Girardi Keese, according to the testimony and an online resume.

Another prequel was the audit by the State Bar of the Girardi situation, which it announced in June 2021. The public outcry over Girardi’s long history of complaints prompted the State Bar to conduct its own special disciplinary audit.

The announcement admitted that “The audit, commissioned by Interim Chief Trial Counsel Melanie Lawrence, revealed mistakes made in some investigations over the many decades of Mr. Girardi’s career going back some 40 years and spanning the tenure of many Chief Trial Counsels. In particular, the audit identified significant issues regarding the Office of Chief Trial Counsel’s investigation and evaluation of high-dollar, high-volume trust accounts.

Nearly a year later, the California State Auditor in its April 14, 2022 report elaborates on the Girardi case, and embellishes the issue with many more examples that go beyond accusations against Girardi, to outline a broken disciplinary process.

Among the cases the auditor’s report highlighted is an attorney who accumulated 165 complaints from 2014 to 2021 and has never been disciplined. In another case, the state bar did not analyze the attorney’s bank records until the agency received more than 10 complaints in two years. Bank records then showed the attorney misappropriated $41,000 from several clients.

The state bar closed 87 complaints against an attorney later convicted in federal court for money laundering through client trust accounts, closing some of these cases through nonpublic measures. Others, called de minimis closings, were done without ever contacting attorney because the agency considered the amount of money involved relatively small.

The State Auditor said that “Our audit of the state bar found that it failed to effectively deter or prevent some attorneys from repeatedly violating professional standards,” said acting State Auditor Michael Tilden in the report. And that the “state bar is not appropriately assessing how conflicts of interest pose a risk that staff will close cases inappropriately.”

And the written response by the Bar to the State Auditor’s report does not dispute the troubling findings. It said “Given the Board’s intense focus on the discipline system, and our understanding of the gravity of the deficiencies that the Girardi matter laid bare, some of the findings in your recent report are profoundly eye-opening and troubling.“

The chair of the State Bar’s board of trustees, Ruben Duran, said in an interview that he was troubled by the audit’s findings, calling its conclusions “some of the hardest-hitting discoveries” that the State Auditor has ever made about the agency.

Assemblymember Mark Stone (D-Scotts Valley), who is chair of the Assembly’s Judiciary Committee, said the audit was “profoundly eye-opening.”

In reviewing the Auditor’s report, the Los Angeles Times said that Girardi was once a top plaintiffs’ attorney and Democratic powerbroker. His downfall in December 2020 was in part triggered by a judge finding that he had misappropriated millions from families of those killed in an Indonesian plane crash. But after the collapse of his Wilshire Boulevard law firm, scores of clients came forward saying they were swindled by Girardi and The Times documented a trail of misconduct allegations going back decades.

Earlier this month, a Chicago law firm accused Girardi and other lawyers at his defunct firm of running “the largest criminal racketeering enterprise in the history of plaintiffs’ law,” pocketing millions from clients, vendors and fellow attorneys.

Long COVID is a colloquial term for the condition whose scientific name is post-acute sequelae of SARS-CoV-2 infection, or PASC. It’s also sometimes referred to as long-haul COVID, long-term COVID or post-COVID conditions/syndrome.

Long COVID is an umbrella term that encompasses cases in which people experience symptoms related to COVID-19 long after the standard expected recovery period.

Research findings on the prevalence of long COVID vary greatly. Some estimate that fewer than 10% of those who had COVID are experiencing long-term symptoms, while others have found it to be as many as half of research participants. One study hypothesizes that up to 80% of COVID patients will experience at least one long-term, persistent symptom. Because the condition is still quite new, reliable longitudinal data is not yet available.

Theories regarding the causes of long COVID vary, with some speculating that it arises from immune activation and others projecting that it stems from damage caused by the virus or a low-level presence of the virus. Based on early studies, risk factors associated with developing long COVID include initial disease severity and other pre-existing comorbidities like advanced age, being female, high blood pressure, smoking, diabetes, obesity and psychiatric disorders.

While most employees who contract COVID can return to work at full capacity within a week or two, those experiencing long-haul symptoms may have functional impairments that significantly affect productivity.

The extreme fatigue associated with long COVID can leave workers with little stamina to meet job demands. “Brain fog” can impede reaction time, memory and the ability to assimilate new information; performing simple tasks and finding the right words to communicate may become difficult.

In addition, previously healthy individuals carrying the mental burden of their long-haul symptoms – and suddenly having difficulty focusing, concentrating and thinking at work – may experience anxiety, stress, depression and even trauma as a result of not being able to perform as they once did. Further compounding these cognitive and emotional challenges is the fact that symptoms can come and go, so employees often can’t predict how they will feel or perform at any given time.

As with any significant health concern affecting the workforce, monitoring workers’ compensation, disability and leave of absence claim counts and durations is essential to grasping the scope of the organizational impact of long COVID. However, there are a few challenges worth noting with regard to tracking long COVID:

– – For now, there is no true diagnostic category for long COVID. (The ICD-10 code for post-COVID conditions is, as of the time of this publication, awaiting final approval.) Tracking COVID claims lasting at least a certain number of days may not yield completely accurate data on long COVID, as they will also include extended hospital stays and debilitating symptoms associated with the original bouts of COVID.
– – Because the symptoms of long COVID are sporadic and often differ from those that people experienced when first contracting the virus, the resulting health challenges are not always accurately identified as being associated with COVID.
– – Workers’ compensation data may not tell the whole story of long COVID. Even in U.S. states where COVID-19 diagnoses among certain categories of workers are presumed to be work-related and thus covered under WC, individuals with long-term complications have a new burden of proof to show that their lingering symptoms are directly associated with their original COVID claims. Extended durations between claim incidents can further complicate this burden of proof and the ability to demonstrate compensability.

For more information, download and read the full paper: Sedgwick: COVID-19: In it for the long haul.

AF Group, a nationally recognized holding company whose affiliated brands provide specialty and workers’ compensation insurance solutions across the United States, has entered into a definitive agreement through its subsidiary Accident Fund Insurance Company of America to purchase AmeriTrust Group from Fosun.

Headquartered in Southfield, Mich., AmeriTrust offers specialty insurance programs and products including workers’ compensation, commercial package and automotive business coverages, and comprehensive product offerings in various industry segments. AmeriTrust is rated “A-” (Excellent) by A.M. Best.

The acquisition is expected to be completed after obtaining regulatory approvals.

“This exciting acquisition aligns two world-class organizations toward a common goal of providing exceptional, customer-focused insurance products and services through our valued agents,” said Lisa Corless, president and CEO of AF Group. “The reputation and performance of AmeriTrust is proven in the marketplace, and we’re excited to welcome their exceptional team to our award-winning organization as we work together toward even greater success.”

With this acquisition, AF Group welcomes AmeriTrust’s expertise in the property and casualty space to its enterprise and further enhances its successful specialty and workers’ compensation products and its capabilities in other lines of insurance.

The investment also reinforces AF Group’s increasingly prominent position and reputation in the property and casualty insurance market, which has grown significantly over the last decade.

AF Group is recognized for its financial strength as a Ward’s 50 company and has earned an “A” (Excellent) rating by A.M. Best.

Stonybrook Capital acted as advisors to AF Group and Deutsche Bank were advisors to Fosun.