Justia Legal Services & Lawyers Directory

My goal is to provide legal advice for life. For individuals, life presents many situations that require legal guidance. Whether you are buying or selling home, preparing an estate plan, dealing with a minor criminal matter, have been fired from a job, or have been injured in a car accident, you should have a lawyer you can turn to for advice. I want to be that lawyer.

Businesses have lives too. They start at incorporation and it gets more complicated every day after that. Dealing with customers who don't pay a bill, a piece of equipment that doesn't work as advertised, a mistake on a construction job, an employee you need to let go, or the decision to sell or close up shop are just a few examples of situations that require legal advice and guidance. I want to be your legal department. If I can't help you, I will work with someone who can.
My primary practice areas include:

Commercial litigation, including: collections, foreclosures (as well as foreclosure defense), breach of contract claims, creditor representation in bankruptcy.

Construction litigation, including: mechanic's liens (and discharge of liens), contract litigation and arbitration, defect and delay claims, and contract review.

Real estate litigation, eviction (both landlord and tenant), quiet title actions, adverse possession claims, boundary and water disputes, purchase and sale disputes, failure to disclose or misrepresentation of building conditions.

Personal litigation, including employment claims, personal injury, divorce and criminal defense, foreclosure defense and debt settlement.

Estate planning, including wills and trusts, pre-nuptial agreements and probate litigation, including will contests.

Land use applications such as variances and special permits, prosecution and defense of zoning appeals.

Basic corporate work, including setting up simple corporations and limited liability companies.

Mediation and Arbitration

Attorney Irene C. Olszewski earned her J.D. from Quinnipiac University School of Law in 2001. She earned awards for Outstanding Legal Scholarship, Distinguished Academic Achievement and Superior Classroom Performance. Attorney Olszewski consults with clients in her East Hartford, Connecticut office. The law firm concentrates on "Client-Focused Legal Solutions" in the areas of Family Law, Probate Law, Wills and Documents, and Lesbian & Gay Law.

Collin Udell's appellate practice focuses on U.S. Supreme Court litigation and on complex or novel issues arising in other federal appeals. Ms. Udell has taken a central role in 25 cases before the U.S. Supreme Court, some of which have been widely acknowledged as among the most important cases of the last few terms, involving bankruptcy, statutory construction, the First Amendment, the Commerce Clause, jurisdiction, arbitration, civil rights, procedure, taxation, and insurance.

In addition to her Supreme Court experience, Ms. Udell has also represented clients in a wide variety of cases in the federal courts of appeal, including matters involving statutory construction, financial services, bankruptcy, securities litigation, labor and employment, intellectual property, administrative law, environmental litigation, complex commercial litigation, and insurance.

For examples of Supreme Court briefing, cut and paste following link in your browser (working with Eric Brunstad):
http://tinyurl.com/ybywlqr

Ms. Udell also has significant clerkship experience, having clerked in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit for the Honorable Bruce M. Selya; the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit for the Honorable Jose A. Cabranes; and the U.S. District Court for the District of Connecticut for the Honorable Robert N. Chatigny. She has also taught criminal law at the University of Connecticut School of Law.

Ms. Udell obtained an LL.M. from Yale Law School in 2001 and graudated summa cum laude in 1998 from the University of Connecticut School of Law, where she was Editor-in-Chief of the Connecticut Law Review. She was the recipient of the William F. Starr Fellowship Award for Outstanding Scholarship, two West Publishing Company Awards for Outstanding Overall Scholastic Achievement, two West Publishing Company Corpus Juris Secundum Awards in Contracts and Criminal Law, and four CALI Excellence for the Future Awards in Contracts, Criminal Law, Jurisprudence, and Statutory Interpretation.

Ms. Udell is a member of the Rules Committee of the ABA Council of Appellate Lawyers, a Division of the ABA Judicial Division's Appellate Judges Conference. She is also a member of the Supreme Court Historical Society, the American Bankrukptcy Institute, and the Federal Practice Section of the Connecticut Bar Association.

Her publications include:
"Dissecting Stern v. Marshall," Law360, July 7, 2011 (co-authored with G. Eric Brunstad, Jr. & Matthew J. Delude)
"Parading the Saurian Tail: Projection, Jung, and the Law," 42 Ariz. L. Rev. 731 (2000)
"Miller v. Albright: Plenary Power, Equal Protection, and the Rights of an Alien Love Child," 12 Geo. Immigr. L.J. 621 (1998), cited in Herrera-Inirio v. INS, 208 F.3d 299 (1st Cir. 2000)
"Intimate Association: Resurrecting a Hybrid Right," 7 Tex. J. Women & L. 231 (1998), cited in Adler v. Pataki, 185 F.3d 35 (2d Cir. 1999)
"Stalking the Wild Lacuna: Communication, Cognition and Contingency," 16 Law & Ineq. 493 (1998)
"Same-Sex Sexual Harassment: Cutting the Gordian Knot," 4 Cardozo Women's L.J. 409 (1998)
"Signaling a New Direction in Gender Classification Scrutiny: United States v. Virginia," 29 Conn. L. Rev. 521 (1998), cited in Cass R. Sunstein, "Trimming," 122 Harv. L. Rev. 1049 (2009)

Ms. Udell was named as a Rising Star in appellate litigation in the 2011 edition of New England Super Lawyers.

An early proponent of joint custody, and a creator of strategies to obtain it I wrote the first book on winning custody. I am concerned with the right of both parents to have a meaninful relationship with his or her parents. I generally represent the underdog. I have also branched into areas of false claims of paternity, efforts to stop the relocation of children by the custodial parent, and the defense of false allegations of sexual abuse and physical abuse.