Julia Aparicio-Mercado

Background
Julia Aparicio-Mercado is Of Counsel to LA Injury Attorneys. She is a California civil litigator with over twenty years of experience representing employees in workplace disputes in the areas of civil rights and wage and hour. Ms. Mercado has represented employees in California State Court, Federal District Court, and in union skelly hearings.  Ms. Mercado has an unwavering commitment to seeing justice carried out on behalf of her clients.  Her professional background reflects a longstanding interest in public service, civil rights, and access to justice. As an undergraduate, she worked with the East Bay Sanctuary Covenant, assisting refugee clients. She later volunteered with El Rescate’s immigration clinic and with Levitt & Quinn on family-law matters for low-income clients.

Ms. Mercado is bilingual in written and spoken Spanish.

Education
Loyola Law School, Los Angeles
Ms. Mercado earned her Juris Doctor from Loyola Law School, Los Angeles, in May 2004. While in law school, she served as an extern with the Los Angeles Immigration Court, Executive Office for Immigration Review, where she drafted orders and memoranda and gained valuable insight from the judges’ perspectives.

University of California, Berkeley
Ms. Mercado earned her Bachelor of Arts in Political Science from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1999. She also participated in an international exchange program at Universidad Autónoma de Guadalajara in fall 1997.

Experience
Ms. Mercado has a variety of experience in prosecuting Title VII, Fair Employment and Housing (FEHA) cases, including: discrimination (including unequal pay), harassment, retaliation, and wrongful-termination matters based on protected categories for race, religious creed, color, national origin, ancestry, physical disability, mental disability, medical condition, marital status, sex, gender, gender identity, gender expression, age (over 40), and sexual orientation.

Ms. Mercado also prosecutes California Labor Code Cases, including whistleblower under Labor Code Section 1102.5, missed and interrupted meal breaks and rest breaks, unpaid reimbursements, unpaid regular and overtime wages, reporting time claims, split shift pay claims, and wait time penalties. Many clients have come to Ms. Mercado feeling “ripped off” or cheated by their employers.  Wage theft can be a misdemeanor.  Ms. Mercado believes wage and hour cases should be prosecuted in the civil setting with the same gravity of a criminal prosecution because it matters when employers take food off of the tables of their workers.

Ms. Mercado is also the owner of Aparicio-Mercado Law L.C., where she has maintained a practice focused on employment law and civil litigation since 2009.

In her spare time, Ms. Mercado has served as a volunteer attorney with Counsel for Justice’s Veterans Legal Services Project assisting with eviction defense. Her community involvement also includes service with the Los Feliz Neighborhood Council’s Education Committee.

Admissions
– State Bar of California, admitted June 2006
– United States District Court for the Central District of California

Trial Training and Continuing Legal Education
Ms. Mercado has completed additional trial-advocacy training through the California Employment Lawyers Association Trial College (2014 and 2024) and the Los Angeles County Bar Association Trial Advocacy Project (2019 and 2024). She continues to participate in legal education and professional development programs.

Professional Affiliations and Memberships
– California Employment Lawyers Association (CELA)
– Los Angeles County Bar Association (LACBA)
– Mexican American Bar Association (MABA)
– Cal. DRE licensed Agent