LSHV welcomes three new Board Members

WHITE PLAINS, NY – Alfred E. Donnellan, Legal Services of the Hudson Valley’s (LSHV) Board Chair and Managing Partner at DelBello Donnellan Weingarten Wise & Wiederker LLP, announced the addition of three new members to LSHV’s Board of Directors.

Christopher R. Cabanillas is the founder and principal of Cabanillas & Associates, P.C., a multi-service law firm with offices in White Plains, Queens, Brooklyn, Bronx, Long Island, Union City (NJ), North Brunswick (NJ), and Bridgeport (CT). He is admitted to practice in New York, Connecticut, and California, and he is also admitted to practice before the United States District Court, the Eastern District of New York and the Southern District of New York. Cabanillas currently concentrates his practice in real estate, foreclosure defense litigation and mortgage loan modifications. Prior to becoming an attorney, Cabanillas attended Columbia University Law School where he earned his Juris Doctorate in 2001 and the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, where he earned his Bachelor of Arts in History in 1997. While in law school, Cabanillas was a New York City Bar Association Diversity Program Fellow and worked as a summer associate at Thatcher Proffitt and Wood, LLP. He is a resident of Greenwich, CT.

Jeremiah Frei-Pearson is a founding partner of Finkelstein, Blankinship, Frei-Pearson & Garber in White Plains. He practices in federal and state courts throughout the country and his areas of expertise include class actions, privacy, consumer fraud, employment law, and civil rights. Frei-Pearson is a passionate advocate and an experienced litigator who typically represents consumers and employees in complex cases against corporate wrongdoers. As a result of the victories he has won for his clients, the National Trial Lawyers Association selected Frei-Pearson as a member of the Top 100 Trial Lawyers in 2014 and 2015. He is a member of the Best Attorneys of America, a distinction that is limited to 100 New York lawyers, and he is also designated as Super Lawyer, a distinction awarded to only 5% of the New York Metro Area. Frei-Pearson is a District Leader in White Plains, where he serves as Chair of the Mayor’s Advisory Committee For People With Disabilities. He graduated from Skidmore College, Magna Cum Laude, Phi Beta Kappa, and from Stanford Law School, where he was a Public Interest Fellow and served as Senior Symposium Editor of the Stanford Law & Policy Review. Mr. Frei-Pearson previously worked as a partner in the class action department of Meiselman, Packman, Nealon, Scialabba & Baker P.C.; at Children’s Rights, a national not-for-profit, which litigates on behalf of foster children; and at Kaye Scholer LLP, a multinational law firm headquartered in New York City. He is a resident of White Plains.

Jane Rembert-Wigfall is a career educator, working for the past 16 years in the Mount Vernon City School District as a Lead Educator for multiple elementary schools in General Education and Special Needs classes. She has also worked as a Lead After-school counselor at Westchester Jewish Community Services’ Advantage After-school program, as well as a Lead Educator in the Archdiocese of New York. Rembert-Wigfall is also a Tax Professional and Instructor for H&R Block Enterprise. She has a Bachelor of Liberal Arts from the College of New Rochelle, a Masters of Education in Instructional Technology from the American InterContinental University Online, a Post-Master Certificate for College Teaching from Capella University, and is working on her Ph.D. in Information Technology with a specialization in College education also from Capella University. She is a resident of Mount Vernon.

LSHV’s CEO, Barbara Finkelstein, said of the trio, “We are delighted to welcome them to the team at Legal Services of the Hudson Valley, and are excited for their leadership and vision in support of our efforts to provide free civil legal services to tens of thousands of our neighbors in the Hudson Valley each year.”

LSHV is the only provider of free, comprehensive civil (non-criminal) legal services to low-income and disadvantaged individuals and families who cannot afford an attorney when their basic human needs are at stake. This includes urgent legal needs such as: domestic violence (orders of protection, child custody, etc.), housing emergencies (eviction and foreclosure prevention), healthcare, children's law and advocacy, disability and benefits, elder law, consumer fraud and more. Founded more than 50 years ago, LSHV serves the seven counties of the lower and mid-Hudson Valley (Westchester, Putnam, Dutchess, Rockland, Orange, Ulster and Sullivan), maintaining a staff of 135 individuals -- including 80 attorneys and 27 paralegals -- working across nine offices throughout its service area.

“The work that we do keeps families in their homes, protects survivors of domestic violence, saves children from neglect, defends seniors against abuse, and serves veterans on the home front,” said Finkelstein. “Since our founding more than 50 years ago, we have been a lifeline for hundreds of thousands of our neighbors at the most desperate times in their lives.” Last year alone the organization handled almost 15,500 cases impacting more than 34,000 household members.

For more information about LSHV, please visit its website www.lshv.org.

(Pictures attached): Christopher R. Cabanillas, Jeremiah Frei-Pearson, and Jane Rembert-Wigfall