J. Mira Hashmall

Los Angeles

Litigation & Appellate Law

J. Mira Hashmall has spent 25 years in commercial litigation, building a practice at the intersection of employment law, entertainment disputes and business torts. Her work spans the full range of complex litigation -- from multiyear jury trials to landmark appellate arguments -- with a particular emphasis on matters involving public entities and high-profile individual clients.

In recent years, two cases have defined the scope of her practice. The first arose from a wrongful termination, harassment and retaliation lawsuit brought by the former executive assistant to Inglewood Mayor James T. Butts, Jr. The city maintained that the plaintiff was properly terminated following an internal investigation into payroll fraud and document forgery. McDade-Dickens v. City of Inglewood, 21STCV02999 (L.A. Super. Ct., filed Jan. 25, 2021).

What began as a standard employment dispute became a study in litigation misconduct. Hashmall pursued the plaintiff's discovery abuses through multiple motions to compel and a sanctions motion that resulted in the court imposing over $217,000 in monetary penalties and sweeping evidentiary sanctions in March 2025. That groundwork cleared the path for summary judgment in November 2025, when the court dismissed the case in full.

"This matter was significant because of the intense public scrutiny and the strong result achieved through aggressive discovery and motion practice that exposed litigation misconduct," Hashmall said.

The second case reached the California Supreme Court and presented a question with consequences far beyond Inglewood: whether an elected public official qualifies as an "employee" entitled to whistleblower protections under Labor Code section 1102.5. Brown v. City of Inglewood, S280773 (Cal., filed Aug. 1, 2023).

The plaintiff, the city's elected Treasurer, alleged retaliation following a series of political disputes with city leadership. Hashmall secured a favorable ruling in the Court of Appeal, then argued the case before the Supreme Court in April 2025. On July 7, 2025, the court issued a published opinion holding that elected officials fall outside the statute's definition of employee. "This ruling provides critical protection for public entities statewide by preventing political disputes from being reframed as employment retaliation claims," Hashmall said. "It stands as one of the most impactful appellate victories in my career due to its broad precedential value."

A third matter -- Andrew Rodriguez v. County of Los Angeles -- illustrated a different dimension of her practice. The plaintiff, a former L.A. County Sheriff's Department deputy, had won an $8.1 million jury verdict in 2019 in a FEHA retaliation and harassment case. Hashmall successfully appealed and reversed that judgment. When the case returned to retrial in February 2025, it ended on the fourth day: following cross-examination and a court instruction that a key portion of the plaintiff's testimony was untrue, the plaintiff voluntarily dismissed the entire lawsuit with prejudice.

Across these matters, Hashmall describes her approach as rooted in the mechanics of persuasion. "A lifelong passion for problem-solving and persuasive storytelling first led me to the law and remains a driving force in my practice," she said.