Deborah K. Marcuse is the Firm Managing Partner of Sanford Heisler Sharp, as well as Managing Partner of its Baltimore office. She represents employees in individual and class actions addressing a range of employment disputes, including suits alleging discrimination, unlawful termination, unlawful denial of promotions, unequal pay, wage and hour violations, and hostile work environments related to race, gender, age, national origin, sexual orientation, pregnancy, religion, and disability.
Deborah’s extensive and high-profile litigation on behalf of attorneys, commercial real estate executives, pharmaceutical sales representatives, and other professionals facing unlawful discrimination and retaliation only tells part of the story. Behind the headlines, she has worked with dozens of clients, many of them lawyers, to amicably resolve their claims against their employers through confidential settlement. A ferocious trial lawyer at every stage of her cases, including pre-suit, Deborah also recognizes that long-running and highly public litigation can be a blunt instrument, a force for good that nevertheless may have significant (and well more than financial) costs for individuals and institutions alike.
In the academic sector, as lead class counsel in Rapuano et al v. Dartmouth, in 2020, Deborah secured an historic class settlement on behalf of current and former graduate students and other student employees alleging a gender-based hostile environment at the Ivy League college. A $14 million monetary settlement was accompanied by programmatic relief valued at more than $1 million, along with a commitment by Dartmouth to work in an historic partnership with the nine plaintiffs in developing initiatives toward a diverse, equitable and inclusive campus culture.
In 2018, Deborah litigated as lead counsel a case on behalf of the former head of Valuation & Advisory for global commercial real estate behemoth Cushman & Wakefield, defeating Defendants’ motion for summary judgment on the plaintiff ’s race and gender discrimination claims and resolving the matter through confidential settlement.
A former academic herself, with a doctorate in the study of religion, Deborah remains a dedicated teacher. In 2021 she was a panelist and co-chair of the planning committee for the annual convention of the National Employment Lawyers’ Association (NELA), where she is also a Co-Chair of the Class and Collective Actions Practice Group and a member of the Trial Boot Camp faculty. She is regularly asked to speak on matters relevant to her practice areas, ranging from how to recognize and address bias in the workplace to litigating equal pay cases.
In 2022 Deborah received the Leadership in Law Award from the Maryland Daily Record and the Maryland State Bar Association. Deborah has also been recognized by the National Law Journal as one of the Elite Women of the Plaintiff ’s Bar (2021) and a Plaintiffs’ Lawyer Trailblazer (2021), and by Law360 as an Employment MVP (2019). Deborah also received a Women Worth Watching in Leadership Award from Profiles in Diversity Journal (2021). Deborah leads the Sanford Heisler Sharp team that was recognized by the Capital Area Immigrants’ Rights (CAIR) Coalition with its 2020 Impacting Justice Award.
Updated Sep 2023
