Attorney Profiles: Jocelyn Larkin

Della Barnett  |   Michael Caesar

Jocelyn Larkin

Jocelyn D. Larkin is the Executive Director of the Impact Fund. Her practice focuses on complex employment discrimination and class action practice on behalf of plaintiffs. Ms. Larkin has served as class counsel in several major employment class actions, including Ellis v. Costco Wholesale, Dukes v. Wal-Mart Stores, Parra v. Bashas' Stores, Inc., Stender v. Lucky Stores, and Vandell v.Chevron Corporation. She co-represented the California respondents in Amchem v. Windsor, before the Third Circuit and the United States Supreme Court. Ms. Larkin has also represented many individual employees in sex harassment, wrongful termination and discrimination actions.  She is a frequent speaker on employment law, ethics and civil rights issues and has published many articles on employment and class action practice. She is the co-editor of the class action chapter of Lindemann & Grossman, Employment Discrimination Law, the leading treatise on employment discrimination law.

Ms. Larkin is a graduate of the University of California, San Diego (B.A. 1980), and the UCLA School of Law (J.D., 1983). Ms. Larkin had a one-year fellowship with the Los Angeles-based Center for Law in the Public Interest, before joining San Francisco's Heller, Ehrman, White & McAuliffe. In 1987, Ms. Larkin became associated with Farnsworth, Saperstein and Seligman, and was elevated to named shareholder in 1990. She served as the firm's managing director from 1991 to1992, until she left to found the Oakland-based law firm, Ryu, Dickey & Larkin.

Ms. Larkin is the co-chair of the ABA Litigation Section's Class Actions and Derivative Suits Committee. She has recently been appointed to ABA Section of Litigation Special Committee on the Future of Civil Litigation.  In addition, Ms. Larkin formerly served as a member of the National Governing Board of Common Cause, a grassroots citizens' lobby committed to open democracy and as the chair of California Common Cause. She is a member of the National Employment Lawyers Association.