About Nancy Rommelmann
Nancy Rommelmann writes for Reason, Bari Weiss’s The Free Press, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and other publications. She is the co-host of the podcast Smoke ‘Em If You Got ‘Em and writes the Substack Make More Pie. Her most recent book is To the Bridge: A True Story of Motherhood and Murder. She lives in New York City.
Articles written by Nancy Rommelmann
Flying Into the Wherever
Anna Mercado Clark is an expert in security, crypto and AIAnna Mercado Clark came to the U.S. from the Philippines in 1993, when the only conversational English she knew she’d picked up watching Sesame Street and the sitcom Perfect Strangers. She and her sister were reuniting with their mother, who’d been working in the States as a nurse while caring for their younger brother. “I tried to stay up the entire plane ride because I wanted to see day turn into night,” Mercado Clark recalls. “I knew that when my mom would call me from the United …
‘They Know a Wounded Animal When They See One’
Young Walgenkim specializes in car dealership fraudYou want to buy a car, so you do your homework. You consult the Kelley Blue Book and study MSRPs and figure you’re good. You won’t be taken for a ride. Hold that thought, says Young Walgenkim. “A lot of people think they got a good deal and they don’t even know they got ripped off,” says the Salem-based attorney, whose firm, Hanson & Walgenkim, specializes in representing clients who’ve been defrauded by new and used car dealers. Car dealerships, says Walgenkim, “know the …
Sports Brain
How former soccer star Haley Morrison feeds her competitive instinctsAnyone who’s watched professional soccer has marveled at how, over this vast, green expanse, the best players know when to hang back and when to attack. Employment attorney Haley Morrison, an NCAA Division I soccer player at Colorado College who played several seasons as a semipro, knows that terrain. “I love when I have an opposing counsel that’s an athlete,” she says. “It usually means they see the bigger picture rather than focusing on the minute issues that really don’t carry …
Online Conduct Unbecoming
Carrie Goldberg is still fighting psychos, stalkers, pervs and trolls—and AmazonStep out of the elevator at Carrie Goldberg’s Brooklyn Heights office and you are met with a big gold C encircling a gold G, a logo so stylish—part disco, part Sex and the City—it could be the opening shot of a movie. “Come, come, you want a Diet Coke?” asks Goldberg, looking glam in a slate-blue shawl coat and matching nail polish. A miniature Australian shepherd yaps until Goldberg assures him it’s OK, whereupon he curls up by a conference room window that offers a …
Best-Laid Plans
How Sharlei Hsu went from would-be doctor with a fear of public speaking to a top litigatorMuch of Sharlei Hsu’s professional life hasn’t gone as planned. And for that, she’s grateful. “I feel like a lot of things in life are a combination of luck and being prepared for when you get lucky, and then running with it,” says the Portland-based insurance and commercial litigator. Born in Shanghai and raised in Salt Lake City to parents working in the sciences, it was understood that Hsu would go into medicine. But upon becoming a naturalized citizen in high school, she decided …
The Moving Target
Former ‘Top Gun’ pilot Thomas P. O’Brien on meeting presidents and staring down gang membersWhen you hear about an attorney who’s flown F-14s, faced down the Crips and Bloods, and prosecuted biker gang members with names like “Danger” and “Monster,” you assume the guy is going to be a steely-eyed Clint Eastwood type. Then Thomas P. O’Brien gets on a Zoom call and he’s self-deprecating and kinetic—cracking jokes about his lack of prowess with technology (“I’m like the lawyer who attended the Zoom court hearing with the cat filter on his face,” he says), and …
'It's a Fraud, It's All a Fraud'
Ira Lee Sorkin and Marc Litt on the Bernie Madoff caseThough Americans love going big, no one wants “Architect of Largest Ponzi Scheme in History” as their epitaph. But that was The New York Times obituary headline for Bernie Madoff last April. For decades, Madoff’s brokerage firm, Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities, seemed to regularly outperform the S&P 500, offering investors annual returns of 50%—and, with at least one client, 550%. It all came crashing down in December 2008. If the financial devastation was …
Soft Landings
Victoria Blachly speaks for those who can’t speak for themselvesVictoria Blachly doesn’t bring people back from the dead. Just nearly. Blachly is a fiduciary litigator focusing on matters affecting the elderly. Many of her clients are experiencing memory loss while trying to navigate complex end-of-life legal issues. “It is definitely a challenge, working with clients with memory loss,” says the Samuels Yoelin Kantor partner. “I’m often dealing with families fighting about wills and trusts, or capacity cases, undue influence, financial elder …
The Law and Aging in America
The golden years: A time to relax, reflect and enjoy the fruits of one’s labors. Scratch that. For many older Americans, it’s a time of decline, pharmaceuticals and financial ruin. Most of us cannot predict whether we will be laid off, and if so, whether we will ever find work again; whether we will suffer a catastrophic illness, and if we do, who might try to profit. When you add that seniros may not want to be a burden on caregivers, or may feel stranded in a world where there’s …
The Straight Shooter
How Sylvia Goldschmidt fell into family law“I did one last Friday with a judge,” says Sylvia Goldschmidt. “It wasn’t the same.” It’s late May and she’s referring to a divorce case she’s handling via teleconference. Like nearly everyone during the COVID-19 pandemic, the founding partner of Goldschmidt & Genovese, who normally works out of her offices in Manhattan and White Plains but is speaking from her home in Westchester, has had to improvise. This means court dates carried out via Zoom, with only attorneys and …
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