Constangy Expands Labor & Employment Team with Two Senior Counsel in Chicago and Los Angeles

Constangy is pleased to announce that Helen Braginsky and Leo Tyree have joined the firm as senior counsel in its Los Angeles and Chicago offices, respectively. Both attorneys represent employers in labor and employment matters, bringing significant litigation, counseling, and workplace law experience to the firm.

Helen Braginsky – Los Angeles

Helen, based in Los Angeles, represents employers in complex employment litigation and advises businesses on workplace compliance, employee relations, and risk management. She works with national and multinational companies on a wide range of employment matters, including hiring, discipline, terminations, workplace investigations, personnel policies, and compliance initiatives.

Her litigation practice includes defending employers in disputes involving discrimination, harassment, retaliation, wrongful termination, unfair competition, and wage and hour claims. Helen also regularly defends employers in complex wage and hour class actions and Private Attorneys General Act (PAGA) representative actions involving employee classification, meal and rest period compliance, overtime pay, and off-the-clock work. She represents clients in state and federal courts, arbitration proceedings, and before administrative agencies, including the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), California Civil Rights Department (CRD), and Division of Labor Standards Enforcement (DLSE).

Helen also advises employers on federal and state employment law compliance, including wage and hour requirements, leave and accommodation issues, and workplace investigations. Her experience includes counseling multinational employers on employment issues arising from corporate transactions, including employment due diligence, workforce restructurings, cross-border employment compliance, restrictive covenant agreements, separation agreements, and policy harmonization across multiple jurisdictions.

Helen earned her J.D. from Pepperdine University School of Law and studied at the Straus Institute for Dispute Resolution. She earned her B.A. from the University of California, Los Angeles.

Leo Tyree – Chicago

Leo, based in Chicago, is a trial attorney, trusted advisor, and strategic counselor who represents employers in traditional labor relations, employment litigation, workplace counseling, and emerging employment and antitrust matters. She advises employers on collective bargaining, union relations, labor arbitrations, employment litigation, workplace investigations, and day-to-day employment matters and represents employers before federal and state courts and administrative agencies.

Leo’s traditional labor practice includes collective bargaining negotiations, grievance administration, labor arbitrations, contract interpretation, union-management relations, and the defense of unfair labor practice charges. She also counsels employers on employee discipline, accommodations, leave management, reductions in force, restrictive covenants, trade secret protection, and employment issues arising from mergers, acquisitions, strategic partnerships, and other business transactions, including labor market competition and workforce mobility considerations.

Before joining Constangy, Leo served as a Senior Trial Attorney with the Federal Trade Commission, where she represented the agency in significant antitrust investigations and litigation involving labor market competition, workforce mobility, restrictive employment agreements, and other complex competition issues. Earlier in her career, she represented employers in municipal government and private practice, handling traditional labor relations, employment litigation, workplace investigations, collective bargaining, labor arbitrations, unfair labor practice proceedings, government litigation, and other workplace matters before state and federal courts and administrative agencies.

Leo earned her J.D. from the University of Iowa College of Law, where she was a member of the Iowa Law Review. She earned her B.A. in political science, with honors, from Cornell College.