Atty. Gary R. Kessler

Gary has practiced employment and related business law in Atlanta since 1977. He actively practices primarily in Georgia, Florida and Alabama but also represents clients throughout the Southeast. He has been certified by the Florida Bar as a Specialist in Labor and Employment Law and has been named as a SuperLawyer every year since 2006.

He is the principal and founder of Gary R. Kessler, P.C., and is Of Counsel with the firm Martenson, Hasbrouck & Simon LLP, based in Atlanta, Georgia. His focus areas of practice include:

• Non-competition provisions;
• Confidential information and trade-secret litigation and trials;
• Non-solicitation of customer and employee provisions;
• Employment-agreement negotiations, particularly as it relates to severance pay and benefits, restrictive covenants, change-in-control provisions, qualified and non-qualified compensation plans, and equity pay-outs;
• Executive compensation and benefit agreements;
• Employment discrimination litigation trials on behalf of Employers as well as Senior Executives;
• Employee-benefit and pension-plans litigation; and
• Mediation and arbitration of employment-related disputes.

Gary also represents employers and highly-compensated executives in matters of unfair competition, employee raiding, duty-of-loyalty claims and protection of confidential business data.

He has litigated several hundred lawsuits concerning executive employment agreement breaches, unfair competition, trade secrets, employment discrimination, non-competition and non-solicitation agreements and related tort claims.

Throughout his career of over thirty-five years, Gary has represented a broad variety of clients, including Senior Executives and Employers in finance, banking, technology, textiles, hospitals, temporary employee leasing services, manufacturing, insurance, advertising and retail.

Gary graduated from the University of Alabama in 1972 and with honors from Cumberland School of Law, Samford University, in 1976. He then completed a Federal Court Clerkship with the Honorable Virgil T. Pittman with the United States District Court in Mobile, Alabama before moving to Atlanta in 1977.

He is an active member of the Bar Associations of Georgia, Florida and Alabama. He is also a member of the American Bar Association (including the Labor and Employment Litigation Sections) and the Lawyers Club of Atlanta. He was admitted to the United States Supreme Court in 1988 and is a member of numerous Federal Trial Courts and Appeals Courts throughout the United States. Since 2011, Gary has been a member of the Executive Committee of the Labor and Employment section of the State Bar of Georgia and is the chair of that committee until July 2015.

During his non-work time, he enjoys competing in various outdoor activities such as cycling, running and triathlons.  Gary has completed eleven Ironman triathlons and hopes to compete in the World Championship in Kona someday before it is “too late.” He spends any additional free time with his wife and family, and frequently travels to Watercolor, FL.