Description
You're an attorney or a judge...why should you learn about mediation or arbitration? Watch this video and find out.
Meet the presenters for this series!
Contributors
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Steven M. Bierman, partner, Sidley
Steven Bierman served as head or co-head of Sidley Austin LLP’s New York litigation department for 25 years, led their Commercial Litigation and Disputes practice, and sat on the Executive Committee. His practice revolves around commercial and financial disputes, fraud, bankruptcy, employment-related claims, and shareholder class action and derivative litigation; he also advises clients regarding conflict management and the prevention, evaluation, and early resolution of disputes. Steve serves on the Mediation Panels of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York and New York State Courts, and has received international mediator accreditation by the Centre for Effective Dispute Resolution (CEDR), and he serves as Co-Chair of the Mediation Committee of the International Institute for Conflict Prevention and Resolution (CPR). He has authored and edited works on commercial disputes and e-commerce litigation. Steve is also a brand new member of the Justice Marie L. Garibaldi ADR American Inn of Court.
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N. Janine Dickey, Esq., APM
In addition to over 30 of experience in litigation and ADR, in 2015, Janine was honored as ADR Practitioner of the Year. She has conducted hundreds of successful mediations and arbitrations of business, employment, real estate and probate matters. She is a frequent presenter and trainer of conflict resolution and negotiation techniques, and offers advanced video conferenced services. Janine is an Accredited Professional Mediator in Business & Commercial Mediation, recognized by the National Academy of Distinguished Neutrals, and has served on the NJ Supreme Court Committee for Complementary Dispute Resolution. She is past Chair of NJSBA Dispute Resolution Section, past Co-Chair of NJAPM Employment Mediation Interest Group, and currently serves on the Executive Committee of the Justice Marie L. Garibaldi American Inn of Court for ADR. For more information, please contact her directly.
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Margarita Echevarria
Margarita is an independent arbitrator and mediator in private practice with more than 25 years’ experience in the financial services industry. She has roles as in-house counsel and Chief Compliance Officer in both New York and New Jersey. Margarita is experienced in handling litigation, claims issues, regulatory policy, contract drafting, product development, corporate secretarial assignments, and compliance programs (including Federal Reserve Board requirements). She was also an adjunct faculty member at Seton Hall Law School (NJ) for Insurance Law. Margarita reads and speaks Spanish, has many memberships on the FINRA and many professional associations including the Justice Marie L. Garibaldi American Inn of Court for ADR.
Find out more about Margarita here.
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Angela Foster, PhD
Certified as a mediator and arbitrator, Dr. Foster’s ADR practice focuses on complex commercial cases including disputes involving intellectual property, technology, commercial, licensing and business-related issues. She also serves as a neutral in securities, consumer, and other complex commercial matters. She has served as a sole arbitrator, co-arbitrator, chairperson, and mediator in hundreds of domestic and international cases involving a broad array of contractual agreements, technologies, and industries. She is past chair of the Dispute Resolution Section of the New Jersey State Bar Association and their 2021 James B. Boskey Award winner. She is a roster member of numerous other alternative dispute resolution panels. Angela was appointed to the Silicon Valley Arbitration & Mediation Center's List of the World's Leading Technology Neutrals. She is an invited fellow of the College of Commercial Arbitrators, a member of the AAA-ICDR Council and peer-reviewed member of the National Academy of Distinguished Neutrals. Angela frequently publishes articles on intellectual property law and alternative dispute resolution, and participates on various panels. Angela received a PhD in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, and bachelor’s in Microbiology and juris doctorate in law from Rutgers University. Find out more about Angela here.
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Susan Guthrie, principal, Learn to Mediate Online
Susan Guthrie, nationally recognized as one of the Top Family Law and Mediation Attorneys, has been helping individuals and families navigate separation and divorce for over 30 years. Susan has also recently partnered with mediation legend, Forrest “Woody” Mosten, to create the Mosten Guthrie Academy to provide cutting edge gold-standard trainings for attorneys, mediators and other professionals. Susan is honored to serve on the Executive Council of the ABA's Section of Dispute Resolution as the Membership Officer and to be a Co-Chair of the Mediation Committee and Annual Advanced Mediation Skills Institute. As an expert in online mediation, Susan has been training colleagues and other professionals in the practical and ethical considerations of online mediations using innovative programs and webinars for more than two years with over 17,000 dispute resolution professionals benefiting from her program through Learn to Mediate Online so far.
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Laura A. Kaster
Laura serves as an arbitrator and mediator in a wide variety of complex commercial and technology matters. She is very active in the legal community. Before she become chair for the NYSBA Dispute Resolution Section, she was the president of the Justice Marie L. Garibaldi ADR Inn of Court, and chair of the NJSBA Dispute Resolution Section. She has won many awards for her ADR work, including the prestigious Richard K. Jeydel Award Winner for ADR Excellence 2018 and ADR Practitioner of the Year 2014, as well as having authored and edited several blogs, articles and a few books. She brings over thirty years of experience to bear as the head of her own ADR firm, Appropriate Dispute Solutions. Find out more about Laura here.
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Erika Levin
Erika is a member of Fox Rothschild's International Arbitration group and focuses her practice on resolving high-stakes commercial disputes. A former general counsel for a litigation finance company, Erika has extensive experience in cross-border litigation, as well as enforcement and asset recovery. A Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators, Erika serves as an arbitrator for many of the leading arbitral institutions. For every client, Erika believes in getting to the right result as quickly and cost-effectively as possible. She uses early and aggressive case assessment and creative problem solving to chart the most expeditious paths to the finish line by developing potential exit ramps and identifying and exploiting key leverage points.
Born in Brazil, Erika has developed a network of contacts throughout the world. A significant part of her practice is dedicated to disputes and monetization opportunities relating to Brazil and Latin America. For more than a decade, Erika has taught courses in international commercial arbitration and fashion law, as an adjunct professor at Rutgers University School of Law. She has also taught LL.M. courses in comparative corporate law at the Swiss International Law School and has served as a guest lecturer in international arbitration courses at Harvard University, Columbia University, the University of São Paulo and the Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro. Erika is a dual citizen of the United States and Brazil. Find out more about Erika here.
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Hon. Marie E. Lihotz (ret'd)
Judge Lihotz retired from the judiciary after serving twenty years. She was one of the senior judges in the Appellate Division, where she Presided over Part B. Currently, she is Of Counsel with Archer Law, working with the ADR Practice Group, at firm offices in Hackensack, Red Bank, Princeton and Haddonfield. Judge Lihotz provides mediation and arbitration services, including appellate arbitration, of civil, family, probate, commercial, discovery, and employment disputes. Further she provides consultation services for attorneys regarding trial and appellate submissions.
Judge Lihotz is a member of the New Jersey State Bar Association, the Supreme Court CDR Committee, the Justice Garibaldi ADR Inn of Court, and a founding member and past President of the Thomas J. Forkin Family Law Inn of Court. She remains active in legal education including writing and lecturing for NJICLE; New Jersey Association for Justice; Burlington County Bar Association, where she also serves as a trustee; the Camden County Bar Association; a prior guest lecturer for Rutgers School of Law, Camden; and along with the Hon. Marianne Espinosa, JAD (retired) Judge Lihotz submits a regular column for the New Jersey Law Journal on Appellate Practice.
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Robert E. Margulies
Robert is a partner in the law firm of Schumann Hanlon Margulies, LLC. He is admitted to practice in New Jersey, New York, Massachusetts, the United States Supreme Court and the Second and Third Circuit Courts of Appeals. He maintains a full service law practice with concentration on litigation, commercial matters, personal injury, civil rights, employment and discrimination, insurance, products liability and Appellate practice. He has tried numerous civil, chancery, probate, family and criminal cases and has participated in at least twenty cases with published opinions. He has also developed an active mediation and arbitration practice, presiding over at least eighteen hundred mediation cases since 1995. Find out more about Robert here.
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Suzanne McSorley
Sue is Of Counsel in the Lawrenceville, NJ office of Stevens & Lee, where she concentrates her practice in complex commercial litigation and dispute resolution, counseling clients in the pharmaceutical, health care, manufacturing, construction and insurance industries, with a particular emphasis on construction matters. In addition, she has served as a mediation neutral since 1997, is an arbitrator on the AAA roster for complex commercial and construction disputes and has counseled and represented lawyers on professional responsibility and ethics matters since the early 1990s. Sue devotes a substantial part of her construction practice to representing parties, especially owners, in negotiating and drafting agreements of all types relating to construction projects, and in providing advice to clients during construction, aimed at avoiding and resolving disputes before they become claims.
Find out more about Sue here. -
Terri Roth Reicher JD, LLM
Terri Roth Reicher is an attorney mediator / arbitrator and maintains an active alternate dispute resolution (ADR) private practice in New Jersey. She was the 2017 recipient of the Richard Jeydel Award for Excellence in ADR and Service to the Dispute Resolution Community, and is a charter member of the elite National Academy of Distinguished Neutrals (NADN). She has been appointed by the NJ Supreme Court to serve as a Fee Arbitrator; she serves on the panel of statewide mediators handling a wide range of commercial disputes with an expertise in healthcare and employment matters. Terri was a United States Equal Opportunity Commission mediator and on the Multidisciplinary Bioethics Committee for the Atlantic Health System. She teaches and trains on the subject of Dispute Resolution Processes. She is a current member and past president of the Justice Marie L. Garibaldi ADR American Inn of Court.
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Andrew Smith
Andrew leads the Andrew Smith Law Group LLC. His practice includes Alternative Dispute Resolution, Complex Commercial, Business, Employment, Technology, Compliance, and Entrepreneurship. He also provides executive coaching services to attorneys. He formerly worked with Axiom Global where his clients included Unilever, Clear Point Technologies, Goldman Sachs, Realogy, and Marriott Hotels.
Andrew served as President of New Association of Professional Mediators where he directed an organization of over 300 attorneys, psychologists, CPAs, engineers, and business leaders dedicated to resolving disputes through mediation.
Find out more about Andrew here.
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Richard H. Steen
Richard Steen is the founding member of Richard H. Steen, LLC, Attorneys at Law; an AV rated firm practicing in the areas of construction and complex commercial disputes and alternative dispute resolution (ADR). Mr. Steen serves as an arbitrator and mediator for the State and Federal Courts, the American Arbitration Association and in private proceedings. Mr. Steen is a Past President of the New Jersey State Bar Association. He is a past chair of the NJSBA Construction Law Section and was the founding chair of the Dispute Resolution Section. He has served on a number of New Jersey Supreme Court Committees and is a Master and a Past President of the Garibaldi ADR Inn of Court.
Mr. Steen is a Fellow of the American Bar Foundation and the National Conference of Bar Presidents, and has served as a delegate to the ABA House of Delegates. He served on the Steering Committee of Division 1, Dispute Avoidance and Resolution, of the ABA Forum on the Construction Industry and as co-chair of the Construction Subcommittee of the ADR Committee of the Litigation Section. He is also a noted author and lecturer on construction law and ADR, and conducts arbitration and mediation training for the New Jersey Courts, the American Arbitration Association and other industry and professional organizations. -
Hon. Barbara Byrd Wecker, JAD (Ret.)
Since retiring from the New Jersey Superior Court Appellate Division, Judge Wecker has served as a private arbitrator, mediator and litigation consultant since 2007. She is Of Counsel to the law firm Greenberg Dauber Epstein & Tucker in Newark, New Jersey, where she chairs the Alternate Dispute Resolution Department. Judge Wecker is a Fellow of the College of Commercial Arbitrators and a member of the American Arbitration Association’s national panels of commercial, complex case and employment arbitrators and an AAA mediator. She is also a member of the panel of mediators of the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey, as well as its Bankruptcy Court mediators’ roster. Judge Wecker is a board member of the Garibaldi American Inn of Court for Alternate Dispute Resolution and the New Jersey State Bar Association Section on Dispute Resolution, as well as a member of the New Jersey Academy of Mediators and Arbitrators (a chapter of the National Association of Distinguished Neutrals). Judge Wecker is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Cornell University and an honors graduate of Rutgers Law School-Newark. She holds a Masters degree in Counseling from the University of Missouri and a Master of Laws degree from the University of Virginia School of Law.
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Hon. Deanne M. Wilson, JSC (Ret.)
Since retiring from the New Jersey Superior Court in 2014, she has practiced as a mediator and arbitrator through Resolutions LLC, which she founded. In addition to her private ADR practice, she is on the arbitration rosters of the American Arbitration Association and the International Centre for Dispute Resolution, as well as the mediation roster of the United States District Court for the District of NJ. She has been inducted as diplomate arbitrator and mediator into the National Academy of Distinguished Neutrals. Her dispute resolution experience has been engaged primarily in the practice areas of her career as counsel and judge. During her seventeen years on the bench, she presided over primarily non-jury trials involving a broad spectrum of complex civil and family disputes. Prior to ascending to the bench, she spent another seventeen years in private practice where she concentrated in areas of complex business and commercial litigation and arbitration, reinsurance arbitration and insurance litigation, minority shareholder rights, restrictive covenants, environmental law, securities law and arbitration, construction law, franchise law and probate law. Judge Wilson has served as a delegate to the United Nations from the American Bar Association, and as a Master of the Bench in three Inns of Court: Environmental, Trial Practice, and Alternative Dispute Resolution, totaling nearly 25 years. Find out more about Judge Wilson here.