Hagopian

FACTS

Plaintiffs Paul Hagopian, Jonathan Peischl, Joshua McCasland, and Kevin Stokes (collectively, the “Splice Members”) were the founding members of Splice Agency, LLC (“Splice”). Splice was founded in April of 2016. Splice was a healthcare marketing agency located in Alameda County. Although there is some dispute in the record regarding when Maher was hired (Maher says sometime in 2016, plaintiffs alleged it was in December of 2018), it is undisputed that Maher was given the title “Managing Partner.” From a legal standpoint, this is a somewhat confusing title since Splice was never a partnership, and Maher never held any ownership interest in Splice. Maher was an employee. According to Maher, her responsibilities included managing finances, handling matters relating to human resources, insurance, loans, employee benefits, and payroll.

2 In carrying out her responsibilities, Maher, on behalf of Splice, employed the services of TriNet Group, Inc. (TriNet) to handle the company’s payroll and benefits. In order to receive payroll benefits through TriNet, all employees and (according to Maher) members had to sign TriNet’s Terms and Conditions Agreement (TriNet Agreement). Under…