Haynes and Boone, LLP Partner Mary-Christine “MC” Sungaila has been appointed by the American Bar Association (ABA) President as a commissioner of the ABA Center for Racial and Ethnic Diversity (Diversity Center).
The Diversity Center is one of the core entities charged with advancing the ABA’s goal to eliminate bias and enhance diversity in the association, legal profession, and justice system. The Diversity Center oversees four principal entities that each provides a distinct focus to addressing racial and ethnic diversity in the legal profession: Commission on Racial and Ethnic Diversity in the Profession, Coalition on Racial and Ethnic Justice, Council for Racial and Ethnic Diversity in the Educational Pipeline, and Commission on Hispanic Legal Rights & Responsibilities.
At the firm, Sungaila is a member of the Litigation Practice Group in the Orange County office. At the core of her broad appellate practice is Sungaila’s passion for the rule of law and for helping shape undeveloped areas within it. She has briefed and argued appeals raising cutting-edge and core business issues, and helped secure important rights for women and girls nationally and internationally. Clients call on her to craft approaches to emerging legal issues across multiple cases and jurisdictions.
Sungaila has repeatedly been named a “Notable Appellate Practitioner” by Chambers USA, Chambers & Partners (2013-2016). Clients describe her in one Chambers listing as a “gifted appellate lawyer who consistently delivers bottom line results,” and praise her for her “great practical sense” and her ability to “advise on the business side just as well as she does on the legal side.” Sungaila has been repeatedly recognized by the Daily Journal as one of California’s 100 Leading Women Lawyers (2005, 2010-2016) and in 2015 as one of the state’s Top Labor & Employment Lawyers. She was a recipient of a 2015 California Lawyer of the Year (CLAY) award from California Lawyer magazine for the precedent-setting franchisor vicarious liability case, Patterson v. Domino’s Pizza, and in 2016 for a precedent-setting transgender immigration case she argued before the Ninth Circuit.
Outside of her practice, Sungaila has also been honored for her sustained commitment to community service and pro bono work, receiving recognition from groups including California Women Lawyers, Alpha Phi International Fraternity, the Orange County Hispanic Bar Association, the Women Lawyers Association of Los Angeles, and Coastline Community College Foundation.