About Ross Pfund
Ross Pfund is the managing editor of Super Lawyers. He is the editor of the Minnesota, Colorado, Massachusetts, Louisiana and Southwest magazines. An award-winning editor and writer with more than 20 years of experience, he has a journalism degree from the University of Minnesota. His work has also appeared in the Star Tribune and the Norman County Index. As a child, he knew he was cut out for a career in journalism because he never once stuck his hand into his father’s printing press.
Articles written by Ross Pfund
Pro Bono vs. Cons
Villanova Law student Vanessa Stine assists immigrants who’ve been victims of notario fraudVanessa Stine was volunteering for the nonprofit Friends of Farmworkers one summer between law school semesters when she noticed a disturbing trend. Many of her clients—low-wage immigrant farmworkers in need of legal aid for employment-related issues—had also been swindled by people claiming to be lawyers. The problem is often referred to as notario fraud, after the type of legal professional from Spanish-speaking countries, “notarios,” that scam artists impersonate. Scammers exploit …
The Grappler
Former collegiate wrestler C. James Zeszutek learned discipline on the mat. Now, as a partner at Dinsmore & Shohl in Pittsburgh, he puts it to use for some of college sports’ most well-known coachesQ: You’re a recent recipient of the Syracuse Letterwinner of Distinction award. You were on the wrestling team, correct? A: I was there ’68 to ’72 and about ... let’s see, 50 pounds ago? [Laughs] A lot of fond memories. I was lucky enough to have gotten a scholarship and had a great wrestling coach, Ed Carlin, from whom I learned not only so much about wrestling, but so much about discipline and life and how to handle yourself. We had some very good wrestlers. Benny Polano, Bob Rust: …
Choosing Battles
Q: You work with your husband, Joseph. What’s it like to practice with your spouse? A: It’s wonderful. We run our own law firm, so one or both of us are working while the other one is there for the children. Also he is just an excellent attorney, and it’s good to just have a good law partner, a good life partner. We tried the Ellis case together. Q: Tell me about that case. A: It was a unique situation because Kenneth Ellis’ sister was a nurse at the veteran’s hospital where he …
When Life Gives You Lemon Law …
How Amy Bennecoff makes lemonade for her clientsAmy Bennecoff has a lot on her plate. The attorney with Kimmel & Silverman, also known as “the lemon law firm,” appears regularly in court on behalf of clients in lemon law cases and other consumer issues. She’s licensed—and actively practices—in six states, including Tennessee and Wyoming. And she’s appeared on NBC and on local television and radio programs to discuss legal issues. Then again, Bennecoff’s used to answering tough questions before a crowd. “I’ve been in …
Building It From Scratch
Elder law solo practitioner Claire E. Lewis on the Affordable Care Act, dealing with end-of-life issues, and her involvement in establishing the practice area in IndianaQ: What was it that first got you interested in the law? A: There are a couple of factors. I was always interested in elder law, which really wasn’t even an identified field back when I was entering law school. After my grandfather died, my grandmother came to live with my family. So I grew up with an older adult in the household and I loved dealing with my grandmother, talking to her and talking to her friends. She’d have a bridge club over. And I just loved listening to the stories. As I …
Fowler Libre
International lawyer George J. Fowler III of Fowler Rodriguez speaks freely on Fidel Castro, maritime disasters and intestinal fortitudeQ: I understand that you were a refugee from Cuba to America when you were 9 years old. A: On January 1, 1959, Fidel Castro takes over the island and he starts killing people, and [my family fled to the U.S.] I spent the rest of my life building up this practice here and also spent a lot of time trying to bring him to justice. I’ve tried to get indictments to him in many countries throughout the world, including Spain and the United States; tried to nab him a couple times. We almost got him …
Diving In
How Loyola law student Laura Diven plunged into the issues facing LA’s HIV/AIDS communityLaura Diven was looking to take the next step after coming off a May 2011 internship at Lambda Legal, the nation’s largest LGBT legal services organization. “It took me out of my bubble of personal experience and made [the HIV/AIDS] community a personal responsibility for me,” she says. After stints at the California Courts of Appeal and the California attorney general’s office, she was preparing to apply for an internship with the HIV & AIDS Legal Services Alliance (HALSA) when the …
Looking Beyond Aqualung
Providence-based family law attorney Tim Conlon on computer crime in the ’80s, suing the Roman Catholic Church as a Catholic, and how society can help prevent institutional child abuseQ: Apparently you worked in computers during the early part of your career. A: It was in the mid-to-late ‘80s. I did computer crime prosecutions for a while. At the time, it had nothing to do with anything, although it ultimately turned out to be relatively useful in terms of the digital forensic work that I now do. Q: That had to have been on the leading edge of computer work. A: There was no computer crime unit in the Rhode Island State Police at that point. There were people doing …
The Persistence of Mary Anne Sedey
The St. Louis-based employment litigator speaks on pushing through discovery, her voir dire strategy and giving legal advice to Thurgood MarshallQ: Human Resource Executive magazine named you one of the top 10 plaintiff’s attorneys to fear the most. A: They did. Q: Seems like a dubious honor in their eyes. A: Great honor in mine. Q: What first got you interested in the law? A: I’m kind of a child of the ‘60s, and I was very involved in the women’s movement as a young woman, and I wanted work where I could do something about the status of women, and also make a living, and so I was very interested in the law. That …
Expecting the Unexpected
Duluth-based defense attorney David Keegan of Keegan Law Office on authenticity, courtroom surprises and representing the man who turned a recliner into a vehicleQ: What brought you to Duluth? A: I grew up in the Twin Cities area, and I went to William Mitchell College. A lot of the folks that I went to law school with at that time [were] second-career type folks. So I got a chance to bounce off a lot of people who had a lot more life experience, and that opened my eyes up to different areas of law. One of the people that I met there was originally from Duluth, and my younger brother had a lot of contacts in Duluth and I always liked the place …
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