Los Angeles – Trial lawyers must, by definition, be able to work 16- to 20-hour days on occasion, and if their health precludes it, they are disabled, a federal judge here has ruled.

U.S. District Judge Gary Fees found that it was bad faith under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act for New York’s Epstein Becker & Green P.C. to deny full disability benefits to an associate whose blood pressure skyrocketed during trial preparation.