Ms. Morris has devoted her career to defending employers and management in personnel related disputes before federal and state courts and administrative agencies. She has successfully tried employment disputes of all types, including race, retaliation and disability discrimination cases, and has vast experience counseling clients.
Ms. Morris clerked for the Honorable Nanette K. Laughrey, United States District Court for the Western District of Missouri. She has also taught employment law courses as an adjunct professor for the University of Missouri – St. Louis. Ms. Morris frequently speaks on disability, retaliation, harassment and discrimination law issues to human resource managers, supervisors and attorneys and provides training on these topics to companies. Ms. Morris acts as a mediator and neutral evaluator in federal court employment actions in Kansas and Missouri.
Experience
Recent successes include:
- Obtaining a defense judgment in an ADA retaliation trial on behalf of a pharmaceutical manufacturing company
- Obtaining and maintaining judgment on appeal to Tenth Circuit in Title III ADA case with national ramifications on behalf of major non-profit organization
- Obtaining summary judgment in numerous employment cases on behalf of Fortune 500 companies
Missouri
Kansas
U.S. Supreme Court
U.S. District Court, Eastern and Western Districts of Missouri
U.S. District Court, District of Kansas
U.S. District Court, District of Colorado
U.S. Court of Appeals, Eighth and Tenth Circuits
Education and Honors
- Phi Beta Kappa
- Super Lawyers in Missouri and Kansas
- Top 50 women lawyers in Missouri and Kansas
- AV Peer Review Rating by Martindale-Hubbell
- Best of the Bar by the Kansas City Business Journal
- Ike Skelton, Sr. Prize for Trial Practice
Professional Activities
- American Bar Association (Labor and Employment Law Section)
- The Missouri Bar (Employment Law Section)
- Kansas Bar Association (Employment Law Section)
- Kansas City Metropolitan Bar Association (Federal Courts Committee – Vice Chair, 2008)
- Association of Women Lawyers of Greater Kansas City
- The Central Exchange
- Adjunct Professor, University of Missouri – St. Louis (2002-2004)
- Court Appointed Special Advocates (CASA) of St. Louis County (Board Member, 2004)
- Ross T. Roberts Inn of Court (Division Coordinator, 2000-2001)
- Kansas City Metropolitan Bar Association - "Recent Changes in State Law Claims for Wrongful Discharge" - Kansas City - June 17, 2010 - June 30, 2010
- Ogletree Deakins Seminar - "R U Safe from Misuse of Social Media?" - Kansas City - February 18, 2010
- Kansas State Council of Society for Human Resource Professionals - "New FMLA Compliance Requirements" - Topeka - February 12, 2010
- Kansas City Chamber of Commerce - "Retaliation: Employer’s Greatest Liability Risk" - Kansas City - December 9, 2009
- Kansas City Metropolitan Bar Association - "Humanizing” the Corporate Client (and the Opposite)" - Kansas City - June 23, 2008
- Ogletree Deakins Workplace Strategies Seminar - "Retaliation – Employers’ Greatest Liability Risks" - New Orleans - May 8, 2008 - May 9, 2008
- Ogletree Deakins Workplace Strategies Seminar - "Retaliation – The Risks are Ratcheted Even Higher for Employers" - Phoenix - May 10, 2007 - May 11, 2007