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
Mary Daniel Finds Her Voice
How the health care attorney learned to speak upMary Daniel grew up as a member of the Cheyenne-Arapaho Tribes of Oklahoma, where she was taught that brevity was the soul of wit. That’s good advice, surely, but it made law school a challenge. “Culturally, I was taught that you don’t talk to be talking—you choose your words carefully,” Daniel says. “When I went to law school, it was completely different. So I had to learn to use my words a lot more. Now I’m much more comfortable. I have an affinity now for asking questions.” …
Scientific inquiry
Sharon M. Woods, of Barris, Sott, Denn & Driker, applies scientific thinking to her business litigation practiceQ: We don’t see a lot of biology majors who become lawyers. How did you end up taking that particular path? A: Actually, my major is in biology and I also have a teaching minor in mathematics [from the University of Detroit]. People that have gone through in science seem to gravitate to the law just because of the organization of thought that’s required in the science curriculum. You’ll find that a lot of engineers also gravitate to the law after they finish an engineering degree. It …
The Quiet Passion of Shamus O’Meara
The Johnson & Condon attorney advocates for those with developmental disabilitiesIn June 2008, Shamus O’Meara was working at the Edina office of Johnson & Condon when he heard the awful news: Keith Kennedy, a 25-year-old with developmental disabilities, had gone missing from a special needs camp in Wisconsin and was lost in the woods. O’Meara was shocked. Linda Kennedy, Keith’s mother, had been one of the first professionals to work with O’Meara’s oldest son, Conor, who is autistic, at the Rondo Early Education Program in St. Paul several years earlier. The …
Team Player
Richard Meneghello promotes collaboration—in court and on the soccer fieldRichard Meneghello was nervous. He’d spent weeks drafting briefs and crafting the oral argument for the fast-tracked Albertsons, Inc. v. Kirkingburg, a disability discrimination case that came before the U.S. Supreme Court in 1999. The case involved a truck driver with degenerative vision loss in one eye who lost his commercial driver’s license. He had worked for Albertsons, but the grocery chain would no longer let him drive. The man obtained a waiver from the Department of Transportation …
Kate of All Trades
Wyoming’s Kate Fox specializes in doing everything, and doing everything wellKate Fox was 16 and living with her family in Philadelphia when her parents told her the family would be moving to Wyoming so they could start up a ranch near Dubois. It wasn’t welcome news. “I was very much dragged here against my will,” she says. “I have memories of driving across the country on Interstate 80 with my two sisters—mind you, three teenagers, all unhappy. Can you imagine how my parents didn’t just drown us in the Mississippi?” It didn’t take long for Fox to change …
Trademarks, Dragon Boats and Roberta Jacobs-Meadway
The Eckert Seamans Cherin & Mellott IP attorney found her strength on the water during her recovery from breast cancerQ: What drew you to the law? A: Basically, I’m a frustrated writer. It was a love of language that started out in playwriting. But I realized very soon that I lacked the creative talent to write great plays, and being a starving playwright doesn’t have a lot of appeal. The law, and specifically trademark and unfair competition and copyright law, seemed to be a place where I could use some of my interest in writing, work with creative people, work with new ideas … and not be a starving …
Collaboration, Community Building and John Salazar
What the Rodey, Dickason, Sloan, Akin & Robb attorney gets out of his real estate practiceQ: When did you first get interested in the law? A: When I was very young. My uncle was a lawyer. Tibo J. Chavez. I admired him very much. He was also a state senator when I was young. I saw how he was able to help people as both a lawyer and as a senator and I realized the fact that he had a legal background made him more effective as a state senator. So I saw the law as being a path to having a position where I could make a difference. Q: Would you consider him your legal mentor? A: …
First One In, Last One Out
Michael D. Sirota makes it his business to work harder than the competitionAs a teenager, Michael D. Sirota was a middle-of-the-road student. No one in his family had graduated from college, and he was content fixing bicycles at a local shop. “Looking back, I can say that I wasn’t setting the highest standards for myself,” says Sirota. His mom had other ideas. “Being brutally honest, I think she was concerned that, not being the best child in the world, if I didn’t go on [to college], God knows what could happen.” So Sirota enrolled at Ramapo College of …
Preparation, the High Road and Elliott Levin
The Rubin & Levin partner speaks on bankruptcy law and why he never underprepares for a caseWhat first got you interested in the law? I thought that I needed a profession to be able to enjoy my life, make a good living and try to help people. I had a choice between being a lawyer and being a physician, and I chose being a lawyer. I’m the first member of my family to be a lawyer, but since that time, both of my daughters have gone through law school and practiced law. I enjoyed being able to use my mind, and, for example, negotiation is an art, not a science. Knowing how to negotiate …
Ethics, Dignity and Judy Barrasso
The Barrasso Usdin Kupperman Freeman & Sarver attorney speaks on the importance of details and why she’s been in trial so often in the past five yearsOur interview was rescheduled because you suddenly had to travel for work. Do you get called out of town quite a bit? It’s very cyclical. Our firm does a lot of cases across the Gulf South and in addition there’s often times where you’re handling a case that’s here but the clients are from elsewhere. For example, right now we’re representing a Brazilian company and we anticipate that there’s possibly going to be some depositions in Brazil as we fight about jurisdiction. Are …
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