Before starting Messing Adam & Jasmine LLP with his partners Gregg Adam and Jason Jasmine in 2015, Gary was a partner with Carroll Burdick & McDonough LLP in the Public Sector Labor Group. He joined Carroll Burdick in 1976, opened the Sacramento branch office for Carroll Burdick in 1980, and became managing partner of that office in 1984.
In 2014, Gary was elected as a Fellow to the prestigious national College of Labor and Employment Lawyers, of which he was the only union lawyer and one of only six labor and employment lawyers in Northern California – outside of the Bay Area – to be included. In 2018, he was first named as one of the top 500 plaintiff employment lawyers in the United States by Lawdragon, an organization that has been ranking attorneys in the U.S. for over a decade. Also in 2018, Gary was honored as a Centennial Fellow by the Sacramento County Bar Foundation as part of the Sacramento County Bar Association’s 100-year anniversary centennial celebrations. Gary was one of only eleven attorneys recognized for this first-time distinction awarded to “attorneys at the pinnacle of achievement who, through distinguished professional accomplishment, substantial civic involvement and philanthropy, have earned a legacy as founding pillars of the Sacramento legal community.” In 2019, Gary was selected “Best of the Bar” for 2019 by his peers and the Sacramento Business Journal.
Gary has acted as chief negotiator for large California state associations with bargaining units consisting of up to and over nine thousand members, and he is chief negotiator for numerous other local public safety and miscellaneous organizations.
He was lead counsel for Shoemaker v. Myers and White v. Davis, which resulted in landmark California Supreme Court decisions and has litigated matters in the United States Supreme Court.
Gary is responsible for numerous precedent-setting Fair Labor Standards Act cases against the State of California and other public employers, including the “IOU” case. And was involved in the wage and hour case against the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilition that resulted in a record setting settlement of $155 million.
Gary has handled important appellate cases dealing with peace officers, Peace Officers Bill of Rights Act, firefighters, and other public employees.
