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Rikki A. Sapolich-Krol

Rikki Sapolich-Krol is a partner in K&L Gates’ San Francisco office. She has a broad-based employee benefits and executive compensation practice, with experience in areas such as tax-qualified, tax-advantaged and nonqualified retirement plans, executive employment and severance arrangements, equity- and non-equity-based incentive plans and welfare benefit plans. In particular, she focuses on structuring, implementing, administrating and correcting benefit plans and compensation arrangements for public, private, nonprofit and government clients. Her experience includes 401(k) plans, ESOPs, defined benefit plans, 403(b) plans, IRAs, 457 plans, 415(m) plans and deferred compensation and other executive benefit arrangements subject to Internal Revenue Code § 409A.

Rikki also advises plan sponsors and institutional fiduciaries on the fiduciary aspects of employee benefit plans, corporate transactions involving ESOPs, pension de-risking strategies, including annuity purchases, the employee benefits aspects of mergers and acquisitions and benefit issues impacting international workforces. She has also represented clients before the Internal Revenue Service, Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation and Department of Labor in significant audits and investigations.

Rikki was recognized as one of 2016’s “Top 50 Women Lawyers” by the National Diversity Council.

Prior to attending law school, Rikki worked in nursing home administration. She was the inaugural candidate in an accelerated six-year program through the Pennsylvania State University Schreyer Honors College and Franklin Pierce Law Center, completing the requirements of both her bachelors of science and her juris doctorate concurrently.

  • National Center for Employee Ownership (NCEO)
  • The ESOP Association
  • Western Pension & Benefits Council
Additional Thought Leadership Pages
  • “Hold On To Your Hats: Recent DOL Amicus Brief Reminds Employers of the Importance of Scrutinizing Top Hat Plans,” Benefits Law Journal, Vol. 28, No. 4, Winter 2015
  • “The Very Long Arm of the PBGC: Foreign Company Held Liable to PBGC for US Sub's Pension Underfunding in PBGC v. Asahi Tec Corp.,” Benefits Law Journal, Vol. 28, No. 1, Spring 2015
  • “When Less Isn’t More: Illustrating the Appeal of a Moral Rights Model of Copyright Through a Study of Minimalist Art,” 47 IDEA 453, 2007
Additional News & Event Pages
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