New York Bar Journal- July-August, 2021

Page 54

Y O U R N Y S B A LEADERSHIP TEAM 2 0 2 1 - 2 0 2 2 T. ANDREW BROWN, PRESIDENT

SHERRY LEVIN WALLACH, PRESIDENT-ELECT

T. Andrew Brown of Rochester, founder and managing partner of Brown Hutchinson, became president of NYSBA on June 1, 2021.

Sherry Levin Wallach is the deputy executive director of the Legal Aid Society of Westchester County.

A NYSBA member for 36 years, he was chair of the Trial Lawyers Section and Finance Committee, vice-president for the 7th Judicial District, a memberat-large of the Executive Committee and co-chair of the Task Force on the Future of the Legal Profession in 2010 and 2011. In response to the protests motivated by the murder of George Floyd, Brown was appointed co-chair of the NYSBA Task Force on Racial Injustice and Police Reform. He moderated three panel discussions with members of law enforcement, prosecutors, public defenders, and judges that examined the issues contributing to police brutality. The task force will deliver its report and recommendations on how to end deleterious policing practices that disproportionately impact persons of color to NYSBA’s House of Delegates on June 12. For nine years, Brown was a member of the New York State Board of Regents, which provides general supervision of all educational activities within the state and was vice-chancellor of the board since 2017. He stepped down in 2020 to prepare for his role as president of NYSBA. He is a former general counsel of the National Bar Association, the largest association of attorneys and judges of color in the world. He is a past president of the Monroe County Bar Association and the Rochester Black Bar Association. He has served on many other boards and commissions and has also held adjunct teaching positions with the State University of New York. Brown entered law practice as an associate with Nixon, Hargrave, Devans and Doyle (now Nixon Peabody). He has also served as Rochester’s corporation counsel — the city’s chief legal officer and head of its law department. He has been a mediator and an arbitrator on the commercial, employment and complex case panels of the American Arbitration Association for more than two decades. Brown earned his law degree from the University of Michigan Law School, and his undergraduate degree from Syracuse University. New York State Bar Association

A former chair of the Criminal Justice and Young Lawyers Sections, Levin Wallach served as NYSBA secretary for four terms, was a vice president from the Ninth Judicial District to the Executive Committee, chaired the Membership Committee and co-chaired the Task Force on Incarceration Release Planning and Programs. Levin Wallach serves on the Committee on Professional Discipline, the Committee on Mandated Representation and the Task Force on Parole Reform. She is chair of the Resolutions Committee, a member of the new LGBTQ Law Section, and is co-founder of the Young Lawyers Section Trial Academy. Levin Wallach organizes and lectures at continuing legal education programs for NYSBA, the New York State Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and the Westchester County Bar Association on the topics of criminal and civil trial practice, ethics and DWI. She has written a chapter on DWI defense, “Best Practices for Defense Attorneys in Today’s DWI Cases,” in Inside the Minds: Strategies for Defending DWI Cases in New York, as well as articles on criminal justice issues and trial practice. Levin Wallach concentrates her practice on criminal defense. She has also practiced in the areas of estate planning, probate and estate administration, real estate and general civil litigation in the state and federal courts. She serves on Westchester and Putnam Counties’ 18B panels under their assigned counsel plans, which provide criminal defense for indigent people. She is a former assistant district attorney of Bronx County. Levin Wallach was principal at her law firm Wallach & Rendo for approximately 14 years and of counsel to both Bashian Law, formerly Bashian & Farber, and Brown Hutchinson. Levin Wallach earned her law degree from Hofstra University School of Law (now the Maurice A. Deane School of Law at Hofstra University) and her undergraduate degree from George Washington University.

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Journal, July/August 2021


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