About Adam Wahlberg

Adam Wahlberg Articles written 31

For 14 years, Adam Wahlberg was executive editor of Minnesota Law & Politics before taking over as editor in chief of its spinoff publication Super Lawyers. He is a Minneapolis-based writer who never misses a Wilco concert and always roots for the Minnesota Timberwolves.

Articles written by Adam Wahlberg

Brian’s Song

Brian Witkin’s roots led him to music, production and entertainment law 

Brian Witkin makes a living representing clients against people like himself. That may sound like something out of Freud, but it’s actually something out of Sha Na Na. Both entertainment lawyer and record label founder, Witkin has a helluva musical pedigree. His father, Joe, was the original keyboardist for Sha Na Na, while his legal mentor was the band’s rhythm guitarist. “I wanted to be a rock star from a young age,” he says. In high school, Witkin played guitar, sang in bands, and …

A Growing Business

Jason Tarasek on cannabis law and what’s next

It was just in 2019 that Lanesboro farmer Luis Hummel faced jail time for growing and selling hemp products. “The authorities said his products crossed the line into marijuana, which is when THC levels pass a certain threshold, and he was charged with several felonies,” says his lawyer, Jason Tarasek. “It was an innocent processing mistake. The charges were eventually dropped, but criminal prosecution is not something to be taken lightly.” By July 2022, manufacturers like Hummel were …

The Most Options to Do the Most Good

Genevieve Jenkins came to housing law through her work on South Africa’s Constitutional Court

“That was an intense experience.” Ask Genevieve Jenkins about some of the formative times of her life—ranking fifth in Canada in the 1,000-meter dash in college, working for the Eviction Defense Network, or clerking for South Africa’s Constitutional Court—and you’ll hear that phrase again and again. For some, it would be code for unpleasant. To Jenkins, it simply means satisfying. She was raised by her physician father and nurse mother to have a Hippocratic worldview, and that’s …

David Bradley Olsen Hates Making Headlines

But when you represent Jesse Ventura and Brock Lesnar, sometimes you can’t help it

On his first day at the University of Arkansas School of Law, David Bradley Olsen assumed the attire would be college casual. He strolled in wearing shorts and a T-shirt. Then he looked around.  “Most of the guys were wearing slacks, sport coats and ties,” he says. “That’s when it occurred to me that these were private school kids, raised much differently than me. I wasn’t sure I would fit in. I wasn’t sure I could compete.” That feeling didn’t last long.  “After a few days, …

Order & Law

How Eric Magnuson’s devotion to deductive thinking took him to the state Supreme Court and back

If you want to work for a judge, you go where the judges are. That was Eric Magnuson’s thinking in the mid-’70s when he showed up at the Hennepin County Government Center. He was in his third year of law school at Mitchell Hamline and wanted to land a clerkship. But he didn’t have any interviews lined up. Just a stack of résumés. “I started at the clerk of the district court’s desk and asked, ‘Where are the judges?’” Magnuson says from his office at Robins Kaplan in downtown …

Matters of Life and Death

Susan Link has a deep devotion to estate planning. Her pro bono work with Wills For Heroes is a big reason why

Susan Link is a master at guiding clients through the process of drafting a will, designating a power of attorney, establishing a health-care directive. As the head of the estate planning group at Maslon, it’s her life’s work, and she’s good at it. Really good. But nothing could have prepared her to update her own will while giving birth to her premature son and dealing with complications.  “I really thought I might die,” says Link of the 2001 birth. “I had a will but I hadn’t …

‘An Uncommon Level of Common Sense’

Jim Carey spent the first part of his life unsure of his path; he’s spent the second at a full sprint

Duaine Swarthout was trying to figure out what had happened. It was April 20, 2008. One moment he’d been riding his motorcycle and the next he was in the trauma unit at Regions Hospital. Doctors were talking about amputating his left leg below the knee. What was going on? Traffic had been heavy that day, and many vehicles were right up against the line. One guy with three golf-course beers in him just happened to go over it. Swarthout mainly remembers flying through the air. Now, a decision …

Best Man

Keith Nelsen uses his leadership skills to help renew Best Buy

Keith Nelsen has become accustomed to two things in life: leading teams and taking hits. Nelsen, the general counsel for Best Buy, the consumer electronics giant in Richfield, Minn., has been doing both of these since quarterbacking youth football teams in Green Bay. The hits these days may be less physical in nature, but they’re just as brutal. “You might think that being a consumer electronics retailer is a relatively simple business, but it’s not,” Nelsen says. “You have complex …

The Daley Show

Annamarie Daley grew up on a farm, went into complex commercial litigation and is considered by clients to be capable of anything

The case seemed intractable. Arctic Cat was dug in on one side in a matter regarding claims of patent violation for the two-stroke engine technology in its snowmobiles. Injection Research Specialists Inc. and Pacer Industries Inc. were on the other side, claiming infringement. It was January 2003 and the dispute had been simmering since March 2001. Then Arctic Cat brought in Annamarie Daley. Daley, a complex commercial litigator then with Robins, Kaplan, Miller & Ceresi (she’s now with …

Family Business

Michael Jung’s love of law seems to be genetic

Q: Did you start out wanting to be a lawyer? A: I started out in science and engineering. I got out of college and worked on the Space Shuttle for a while; Discovered at that point that engineering in practice was not quite what I imagined it would be; [I] looked at the limitations on my opportunity to interact with people outside the engineering field and was not very satisfied with the direction I was heading. I found myself envying the secretaries because they were the only ones who got to …

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