Our Experience

Did the opposing party care that their machine, due to a legal technicality and an obvious flaw in the system and design of the equipment (in my opinion), ruined my future hockey career, my scholarship potentials, my athletic skills, the hundreds and hundreds of hours of physical therapy, the mental and emotional anguish experienced by all involved? Absolutely not! And so the curious mind began and the interest in the legal profession became a career path.

I have worked as a civil litigation paralegal since 1990, beginning my career with very a prominent law firm in Portland, Oregon, Bogle and Gates, PLLC. At that time, my focus was in general litigation, in order to at some point, narrow down the type of specific area of law I wanted to work in. Throughout my 7 year career at Bogle and Gates I learned a lot about employment law, real estate law, construction law, civil rights law, commercial law, water rights law, labor law, landlord/tenant law, collection law and many other types of law. In addition, I was fortunate enough to work with two attorneys, now sitting Judges in the Court of Appeals

After my 7 years at Bogle and Gates, I decided to move on in my legal journey and joined the well know construction and real estate firm of Tarlow, Jordan & Schrader and worked under the direct supervision of mentor and friend Author L. Tarlow – https://tnslaw.net/art-tarlow/ building up my in depth knowledge of construction and business litigation to a very high standard. It was also during my 6 year period with Mr. Tarlow that I graduated from Portland State University (1997) with a Bachelors Degree in Psychology and Sociology with a Minor in History. I further pursued a Masters Degree in Conflict Resolution. During that period I also became a Court Appointed Special Advocate (“CASA”) for Multnomah County and graduated in the 2nd class of the continuing program. Additionally, at the guidance of Mr. Tarlow and my father, I became heavily involved in real estate, developing and purchasing multi-family, multi-use developments, purchasing and operating duplexes and triplexes throughout the Pacific Northwest as well as participating in start-up company’s both in the legal profession and that of other professions as well. Additionally, I was again fortunate to work with a lawyer, who is now a sitting Judge in the Fifth Judicial Circuit Court.

Upon Art Tarlow announcing his semi-retirement from practicing law in the Portland, Oregon area and leading up to his practice in the Dominican Republic, I branched out and went to work for the second largest law firm in the Pacific Northwest, Schwabe, Williamson & Wyatt.

At Schwabe, I had the distinct pleasure and honor of working with many incredible lawyers, paralegals, assistants and staff. It was an incredible 11+ year run. During that time period, I was 95% primarily assigned to the Chair of the Construction Group and had the divine opportunity to fully develop my love and the education for law and the legal process and more specifically, the true construction side of litigation and all its amazing moving parts. I had the chance to fine tune the experiences, passion, education and drive that both my father and Art Tarlow instilled in me. Because I was working primarily for the Chair of the Construction Group, I had the opportunity to specialize in all sides of litigation, being plaintiff/defendant/witnesses, intensely involved from start to end, from the filing of the Complaint to shaking hands with jurors and learning their thoughts on the verdict, speaking with the judges and learning about the legal procedures from those who make the decisions. I experienced over 100 mediations and arbitrations and over 4 dozen trials, all sitting in the second chair next to my 2nd mentor in my career, a co-pilot if you will. It was the experience of a lifetime and what an experience it was.

It was on my 24th year as a civil litigation paralegal, 3 major law firms later and thousands of hours learning pure litigation skills from the most knowledgeable people in the legal industry, including three sitting judges (in their private practice prior to being elected to the Bench), I took the next step in my life and created Slingshot Legal Services.