Ivelisse Berio LeBeau joined Sugarman & Susskind in 2007, after serving as a Trial Attorney in the Solicitor's Office of the U.S. Department of Labor for 13 years. While at the Department of Labor she primarily represented the Employee Benefits Security Administration (EBSA), the DOL agency charged with protecting the integrity of pension plans, health plans and other employee benefit plans governed by the federal Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA).
As a DOL attorney enforcing ERISA Ms. Berio LeBeau assisted EBSA during DOL investigations and brought legal actions claiming that fiduciaries to ERISA employee benefit plans breached their fiduciary duties to such plans. She worked on many different types of cases, including cases involving trustees to ERISA pension plans who breached fiduciary duties in making investment decisions; service providers to ERISA health plans that failed to disclose their receipt of additional revenue in connection with pharmacy benefit management services or hospital reimbursements; fiduciaries to 401(k) plans who failed to ensure that employee contributions were properly transferred to such plans; and service providers to ERISA retirement plans that failed to disclose and receive authorization to retain revenue, such as float income, generated while providing contracted services. Ivelisse also created training materials for EBSA investigators to use in drafting subpoenas and in preparing cases for litigation.
While at the Department of Labor Ivelisse also worked on enforcement actions brought under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) and other federal labor statutes claiming that employers violated minimum wage, overtime pay, non-discrimination, employee training, housing, and health and safety standards.
Ms. Berio LeBeau is active in the Employee Benefits Committee of the American Bar Association's Labor and Employment Law Section, a national organization of union, plaintiff and management lawyers who specialize in ERISA and employee benefits law. From 2004 to 2006 she served as a Government Fellow to the Committee, and currently she serves as a Co-Chair of the Subcommittee on ERISA Preemption and Effects on Other Laws.
Ivelisse is also an accomplished writer, who was recently appointed as an Associate Senior Editor for the 2008 Cumulative Supplement to Employee Benefit Law, 2nd Ed. (BNA Books), after serving as a Rewrite Editor and Contributing Author on the 2004 through 2007 Cumulative Supplements. She has also been invited to speak at various legal conferences on ERISA and employee benefits law topics.
Prior to joining the Department of Labor Ms. Berio LeBeau was a litigation associate at the Boston, Massachusetts law firm Brown, Rudnick, Freed and Gesmer, and served as a law clerk to the late Honorable Joseph P. Warner, former Chief Justice of the Massachusetts Appeals Court. She is a graduate of Mount Holyoke College and a cum laude graduate of Boston College Law School. Ivelisse is bilingual, crediting her fluency in Spanish to her Puerto Rican roots.
At Sugarman & Susskind Ms. Berio LeBeau's practice focuses on employee benefits law and ERISA with an emphasis on litigation and compliance matters relating to the fiduciary responsibilities imposed by ERISA.
