Jason R. Bristol, Partner
Direct: (216) 815-9600
jbristol@crklaw.com
Key Practice Areas:
Arbitration and Mediation
Civil Rights
Consumer Law
Class and Collective Actions
Employment Law
Wage and Hour
Results: Over 100-million dollars—the value of settlements and judgments achieved by Bristol and his colleagues.
Jason R. Bristol is a nationally recognized advocate for working people and a leading voice in employment law, known for litigating and resolving complex, high-stakes wage-and-hour and workplace rights cases. For more than twenty-five years, he has represented employees at every level of the workforce—from the shop floor to the C-suite—securing millions of dollars in recoveries through both negotiation and litigation. Law and Politics Magazine has repeatedly named him a “Super Lawyer” in plaintiffs’ employment litigation.
Mr. Bristol has led class and collective actions under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act and numerous state wage-and-hour laws, achieving over $100 million in settlements and judgments for unpaid wages and overtime nationwide. He also prosecutes complex employment cases, including breach-of-contract and systemic-discrimination claims based on age, gender, race, national origin, sexual orientation, and pay inequity. In addition to trial work, he is regularly engaged to mediate complex wage-and-hour disputes.
He began his career in 2000 at a nationally regarded class action boutique, litigating groundbreaking cases involving retiree pension benefits, environmental disasters, consumer fraud, employer intentional torts, and employee benefits. In 2004, he joined Cohen Rosenthal & Kramer LLP as a Partner, where he built—and continues to lead—the firm’s plaintiffs’ employment class action practice.
Mr. Bristol’s work has been featured in The Wall Street Journal, The Cleveland Plain Dealer, and national and regional broadcasts including America’s Workforce Radio, This American Life, and WCPN’s Sound of Ideas. A sought-after lecturer and writer on employment law, he serves as an Adjunct Professor at Cleveland State University College of Law, where he teaches courses on the Fair Labor Standards Act and appellate advocacy.
His professional honors include recognition in Crain’s Cleveland Business “Notables in Law” (2022); election as a Fellow of the College of Labor and Employment Lawyers (2020); Leadership Cleveland (2019); induction into the Cleveland-Marshall College of Law Hall of Fame (2019); and membership in The Court of Nisi Prius (Judge, 2025). He is a life member of the Judicial Conference of the Eighth Judicial District and a Master of the Bench in the American Inn of Court, Cleveland Employment Chapter. Earlier in his career, he was named to Crain’s Cleveland Business “40 Under 40,” and in 2016 was one of only 32 Americans selected as a Marshall Memorial Fellow of the German Marshall Fund of the United States.
An engaged civic leader, Mr. Bristol has served on the boards of The Legal Aid Society of Cleveland, The City Club of Cleveland, MetroHealth Foundation, Near West Theatre, and numerous other organizations advancing justice, arts and culture, and community.