Wisconsin Law Journal – WI Legal News & Resources Wisconsin Legal News & Resources

Soon after graduation from law school, Wade Pittman opened the Madison branch of his family’s law firm: La Crosse-based Pittman & Pittman Law Offices LLC.

Hannah Rock helped to create her current job while still in law school.

Sarah Wong is fast establishing herself as an expert in intellectual property law at the Milwaukee-based firm Boyle Fredrickson SC. The 2012 Marquette University Law School graduate earned an undergraduate degree in biomedical engineering, which helped lead to her area of specialization within the law.

Joseph Sarmiento is drawn to insurance litigation because of all the thinking it requires.

Matthew Leffler grew up in the family business of real estate and development, but he knew he needed to find his own direction in an industry he loved.

Eric Schlevensky draws on his more than a decade of experience as an electrical engineer when working with clients to meet their intellectual-property needs.

Denasha Scott never assumes she knows what a client wants. In large part because of her willingness to listen, Scott, who specializes in estate-planning and business law, has risen to team leader of Stafford Rosenbaum LLP’s Business Law Practice Group and is now a member of the firm’s board of directors.

Ann Ustad Smith’s secret weapon is her friendly demeanor. Ustad Smith, chair of Michael Best & Friedrich LLP’s banking and financial services industry group, specializes in helping distressed businesses and meeting clients’ needs regarding bankruptcy, commercial transactions and constitutional litigation.

Nancy Bonniwell is dedicated to serving her clients, colleagues and community. A main factor in her success as partner at Weiss Berzowski Brady LLP, where she practices estate planning and business law, is her ability to build relationships with clients and understand their motivations.

Cheryl Weston wants to help her students to think as deeply about the law as she does. That means they should be able to recognize the intersection of substance and procedure, to understand rules and use them tactically. “If they learn the tools of being a good litigator, they always can pick up the substance of law,” she said. Weston, ...

Maura McMahon wants to know every client’s story. Throughout the past 12 years in the State Public Defender’s Waukesha office, she has advocated for women, children and the mentally ill, but the often-troubling details of those cases have done little to dim her bright outlook.

Debby Tomczyk balances the tangible and intangible in her practice. A shareholder at Reinhart Boerner Van Deuren, Tomczyk specializes in business law and real estate, which she says provides here with an uncommon means of tracking her own success.

Paralegals at an obscure agency that handles appeals of patent applications went years with so little work to do that they collected salaries — and even bonuses — while they surfed the Internet, did laundry, exercised and watched television.

An Appleton spa owner who alleges the city rejected her claim for reimbursement after a water main broke and flooded her business is now taking her case to federal court.

A federal judge has set a January trial date for businessman Jon Ferraro’s claim that the city of Milwaukee illegally barred him from opening a strip club.

Brownsville-based Michels Corp. and 34 other contractors will find out in November how much they owe to a union pension fund following their refusal in 2011 to continue paying.

The Milwaukee Common Council won't appeal a jury’s finding that the city is liable for sewer backups in more than 100 homes in 2008.

The city of Franklin and the Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District are continuing to push for the dismissal of a lawsuit over a sewer project despite the list of plaintiffs expanding from one to 206.

Homer Key, the Milwaukee contractor sentenced to 5 months in prison for his role in a federal money kickback scheme, will appeal his conviction.

Milwaukee’s attorneys are urging the Common Council to pay almost $1 million rather than appeal a verdict finding the city liable for damage when raw sewage flooded multiple homes in 2008.

Five former employees of an Elm Grove security company that contracts with Milwaukee County claim their support of a county living wage ordinance cost them their jobs.

A jury Thursday found contractor Homer Key, accused of colluding to steal federal grant money from Milwaukee County, guilty of felony forgery and conspiring to commit the crime of having a private interest in a public contract.

Contractor Homer Key was particular about his choice of words during his felony theft trial Wednesday, insisting that “retroactive” differs from “backdated” and “units” are not the same as “hours.”

A Milwaukee County Circuit judge blocked a portion of testimony Tuesday from an expert witness in the felony theft trial of contractor Homer Key.

“Time” and “materials” do not appear in Homer Key’s contracts to run a Milwaukee County education program, but the county’s chief auditor said Monday omitting the words did not justify the contractor’s pattern of billing.

Milwaukee County’s lack of competitive bidding for a disadvantaged business education program created an opportunity, the county’s director of audits testified Friday, for a former county employee to funnel federal grant money to a favored colleague.

A Kenosha landowner is urging the state Supreme Court to reject the Wisconsin Department of Transportation’s attempt to avoid paying damages after removing a driveway.

The state Supreme Court is reviewing a lawsuit that Wisconsin Department of Transportation representatives say could set a dangerous precedent for compensating landowners who lose property to construction projects.

Milwaukee contractor Homer Key faces four felony charges in a trial that began Tuesday and is expected to last through May 14.

A contractor accused of bilking Milwaukee County out of tens of thousands of dollars in federal grant money was no more than a victim of an incompetent bureaucrat, his attorney said Tuesday.