Michigan Employment Lawyers

Michigan Employment Attorneys — Holding Employers Accountable

Most workers who've been wrongfully fired, passed over, harassed, or retaliated against don't pursue a claim. The employer has HR departments, in-house counsel, and outside law firms working to protect the company from day one. The worker has a severance offer and a non-disclosure agreement and a pile of bills.

That imbalance is exactly the kind of situation we built this practice to address.

Christopher Trainor & Associates has spent more than 35 years representing Michigan workers whose rights were violated at work. We recovered $1.7 million for a whistleblower who was fired after reporting regulatory violations to a government agency; the employer called it a layoff, and we proved it was retaliation. We recovered $600,000 for a worker subjected to persistent sexual harassment in a hostile work environment where the employer had known about the harasser for months and done nothing.

Employment violations don't just cost people jobs. They destroy financial stability, mental health, and careers that took years to build. We handle every employment case on contingency. Nothing upfront and no fee unless we win.

Why Employment Cases Require an Attorney From the Start

Employment disputes put individual workers up against organizations with every institutional advantage. Understanding why representation matters early is part of protecting your rights.

Employers control the evidence. Personnel files, performance reviews, internal emails, HR investigation records, and communications between supervisors are all in your employer's possession. Companies routinely destroy, alter, or withhold documents that would support a claim once they know litigation is possible. We issue preservation demands immediately and use discovery to compel production of the records that matter.

Retaliation is rarely obvious. Most employers don't respond to a complaint with an immediate firing; that's too easy to prove. Instead they reassign you to undesirable duties, adjust your schedule, give you negative performance reviews that weren't happening before, and make the workplace uncomfortable enough that you resign. These patterns are designed to look like coincidence. We recognize them and document them before evidence fades.

Deadlines are strict and vary by claim type. ELCRA claims carry a three-year statute of limitations. Federal EEOC charges covering Title VII, the ADA, and the ADEA must be filed within 300 days. Whistleblower claims have their own windows. Missing a single deadline by a single day can permanently end your right to pursue a claim. We track every applicable deadline from the moment you hire us.

Multiple legal theories may apply to the same situation. A wrongful termination can give rise to claims under ELCRA, Title VII, the ADA, the FMLA, and the Michigan Whistleblowers' Protection Act at the same time. Identifying and pursuing every viable theory strengthens your position and maximizes what you can recover. We evaluate the full scope of your rights under both state and federal law.

Types of Employment Cases We Handle

Our Michigan employment attorneys represent workers across a wide range of workplace violations.

• Wrongful termination
• Workplace discrimination based on race, gender, age, or disability
• Sexual harassment
• Hostile work environment
• Whistleblower retaliation
• Wage theft
• Family and Medical Leave Act violations
• Americans with Disabilities Act violations
• Pregnancy discrimination
• Workplace bullying

Each case type has its own evidentiary requirements and legal framework. A retaliation claim requires proving a causal connection between protected activity and an adverse employment action. A hostile work environment claim requires showing conduct that was severe or pervasive enough to alter the terms of employment. We identify the strongest theory for your specific facts and pursue every available avenue.

Michigan and Federal Laws That Protect Workers

Michigan workers are protected by overlapping layers of state and federal law. Understanding which statutes apply to your situation determines what you can recover and where you file.

Michigan Whistleblowers' Protection Act (MCL 15.361)

This statute prohibits employers from retaliating against employees who report — or are about to report — violations of law or regulation to a public body. Public bodies include law enforcement agencies, regulatory authorities, and legislative bodies. Retaliation includes termination, demotion, suspension, threats, and any other adverse employment action tied to the report. Our $1.7 million whistleblower verdict is the most direct evidence of what this statute can accomplish when the case is built correctly.

Elliott-Larsen Civil Rights Act (MCL 37.2101)

Michigan's primary anti-discrimination statute prohibits employment discrimination based on religion, race, color, national origin, age, sex, height, weight, and marital status. Unlike Title VII, which only covers employers with 15 or more employees, ELCRA applies to employers with one or more employees — making it broader than its federal equivalent for most Michigan workers. Claims must be filed within three years of the discriminatory act.

Michigan At-Will Employment and Its Exceptions

Michigan follows the at-will employment doctrine, meaning employers can generally terminate employees for any reason. The exceptions are where wrongful termination cases come from. An employer cannot fire you in violation of a specific statute, in contravention of public policy, or in breach of an express or implied employment contract. These exceptions cover the vast majority of legitimate wrongful termination claims in Michigan.

Federal Protections: Title VII, ADEA, ADA, and FMLA

Title VII of the Civil Rights Act prohibits discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, and national origin. The Age Discrimination in Employment Act protects workers 40 and older from age-based discrimination. The Americans with Disabilities Act requires reasonable accommodations and prohibits disability discrimination. The Family and Medical Leave Act guarantees eligible employees up to 12 weeks of unpaid, job-protected leave for qualifying medical and family situations. Federal claims under Title VII, the ADA, and the ADEA require an EEOC charge before filing suit, and that charge must be filed within 300 days.

Employment Case Results in Michigan

Every case is different and past results don't guarantee a future outcome.

• $1,700,000 — Whistleblower verdict for an employee terminated after reporting regulatory violations to a government agency. The employer characterized the firing as a layoff. Our investigation uncovered direct evidence of retaliatory intent.
• $600,000 — Sexual harassment recovery for a worker subjected to persistent unwanted advances and a hostile work environment. The employer had been aware of the harasser's conduct for months and taken no corrective action.
• $300,000 — Wrongful termination settlement for a client fired in violation of public policy.

How We Build an Employment Case

Employment cases are won through preparation, documentation, and knowing where to look for evidence the employer assumed would stay hidden.

The process starts at your free consultation. We review the facts, identify every potential claim under state and federal law, assess what evidence exists, and give you an honest picture of where your case stands. You make an informed decision about how to proceed — we don't pressure and we don't oversell.

Once retained, we send immediate preservation demands to your employer covering all relevant documents: emails, performance reviews, HR files, internal communications, and any recordings or surveillance footage. Employers who destroy documents after receiving a preservation demand face serious sanctions in litigation, including instructions to the jury that they can infer the destroyed evidence was unfavorable.

Depending on your claims, we file charges with the EEOC, the Michigan Department of Civil Rights, or directly in state or federal court. We navigate the administrative requirements that many employment claims require before a lawsuit can be filed, making sure no procedural step is missed.

Through aggressive discovery and depositions of supervisors, HR representatives, and corporate decision-makers, we build the record. We subpoena internal investigation files, comparator employee records, and communications that reveal discriminatory or retaliatory intent. Employment cases routinely turn on internal communications the employer never expected to produce.

We retain vocational economists and workplace experts when needed to quantify the full financial impact of what your employer did — not just lost wages to date, but future earning capacity and the long-term career harm that discrimination and retaliation cause. That full damages picture is what drives serious settlement offers.

Key Michigan Statutes in Employment Law Cases

For plain-language explanations, visit our Employment Law statutes guide.

• MCL 15.361 — Michigan Whistleblowers' Protection Act — prohibits retaliation against employees who report violations to public bodies
• MCL 37.2101 — Elliott-Larsen Civil Rights Act — Michigan's primary anti-discrimination law covering employers with one or more employees
• MCL 600.5805 — Statute of limitations — three-year window for intentional workplace harm
• MCL 600.5855 — Fraudulent concealment tolling — when an employer hides its wrongdoing, the limitations clock may not have started running
• MCL 600.2911 — Defamation limitations — relevant when an employer makes false statements about you to damage your reputation
• MCL 600.6303 — Collateral source rule — how unemployment benefits and other payments interact with your employment damages award

Serving Workers Across Michigan

Employment violations happen in every industry and every part of the state — in Detroit corporate offices, Grand Rapids manufacturing plants, Flint healthcare facilities, Lansing government agencies, and small businesses in every Michigan county.

Christopher Trainor & Associates represents workers in both Michigan state courts and the U.S. District Courts for the Eastern and Western Districts of Michigan. Whether you were wrongfully terminated in Southfield, harassed at a job in Ann Arbor, denied medical leave in Sterling Heights, or retaliated against for reporting fraud in Troy, we have the reach and resources to take your case.

Call (248) 886-8650 any time for a free, confidential consultation. You pay nothing unless we win.