Neria’s Legal Gamble Backfires
They have an idiom in Brooklyn for someone overly clever, cunning, or sly to the point where it backfires. That person is “too cute by half.”
Apropos of that, this is the third in our series on Michal (pronounced Me-Howl) Neria, 38, of Kingston, New York. She is suing Nicole Daedone, former owner of OneTaste Inc., Rachel Cherwitz, and Rachael Hemsi, who worked for Daedone, in Brooklyn federal court.
Michal Neria on her wedding day; a day she claims was a horror for her.
All three do not have enough money to justify a multi-year jury trial federal lawsuit, with likely appeals. A hotshot legal team from Kohn Swift represents Neria and will be paid a contingency fee, where the standard is one-third of what they collect, contigent on collecting anything at all.
Adding Millionaires to the Mix
Daedone, Cherwitz, and Hemsi are defendants in the lawsuit because they were around in 2015 when Neria claimed she worked at OneTaste Inc.
To correct the economic imprudence of suing three people without sufficient money to justify a lawsuit, Neria added three people as defendants whom she never met —Anjuli Ayer, Austin Ayer, and Amanda Dunham. They do have money.
They bought OneTaste Inc. in 2017 and had never laid eyes on Neria, a happy fact for them both legally and practically. Neria was gone by 2015.
The glue that binds is the seventh defendant in the lawsuit: “OneTaste, Inc., a privately held California corporation with its principal place of business in San Francisco, California.”
Neria brings a forced labor lawsuit, one of an alleged fear of serious harm based on her alleged five-month employment with OneTaste Inc. in 2015.
Neria’s Allegations
Neria claims:
She “quit her job as a teaching assistant to work as a full-time salesperson for OneTaste.”
“(She) worked from 7:30 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. 7 days a week selling Courses…”
She “performed the labor and services because… if she did not… she would… endure psychological, financial and reputational harm….”
“Michal performed such labor and services because she feared that if she did not, OneTaste would leave her without the ability to generate commissions from sales which would cause her a significant financial strain.”
She “performed the labor and services at the direction of OneTaste….”
“OneTaste… maintained control over… Michal.”
“Maintaining this control was a means OneTaste used to ensure that (Michal) would adhere to its rules, including by performing the labor and services.”
“Michal ran recruitment events in New York to sell courses to the public…”
“When Michal left OneTaste,… Michal was no longer permitted to sell Courses and earn commissions. As a result of Michal’s leaving OneTaste, Michal lost virtually her entire income and her housing.”
The Truth Unveiled
This is quite horrifying, if any of it were true.
However, besides being somewhat more than inordinately truth-challenged, Neria has another problem: She never worked for OneTaste Inc., a California corporation with its principal place of business in San Francisco.
Neria worked for OneTaste NY LLC, a franchise in New York.
Under the law, every corporation is responsible for its own liabilities. The employment contracts or liabilities of one corporation do not transfer to another. Even if two corporations have the same shareholders, which was not the case, the two are separate entities.
Legal Misstep
Just as you can’t sue John Smith of California for the actions of John Smith of NY, you can’t sue OneTaste Inc. for alleged torts of OneTaste NY LLC against one of its employees.
This is bad news for Neria.
Michal Neria
Neria’s employment-based claims against OneTaste Inc. go out the window. And the three people she is suing – the ones with money – Ayer, Ayer, and Dunham – never owned the franchise OneTaste NY LLC.
Neria just lost her millionaires.
Of course, she could sue OneTaste NY LLC and its owners. She knows who they are. Take for instance Ravi Agrawal, the owner and managing member of OneTaste LLC. Neria did not include him in her lawsuit. Why?
She knows she worked for OneTaste NY LLC, not OneTaste Inc. Why did she not tell her attorneys?
Maybe she thought she’d get away with it.
As they say in Brooklyn, Michal Neria is just too cute by half.
