Super Lawyers - Maryland 2013

Hendler for years. “You have an intelligent
dialogue to get resolution for the clients.”
During the decades, cultural mores shifted.
Divorce, once taboo, became common.
Matrimonial law changed. Hendler adapted.

Today, cases hinge upon issues such as surrogate parenting, same-sex marriage and the complicated unions of people from varying cultures. Couples in second marriages seek prenuptial agreements. One of Hendler’s clients fought for possession of sperm at a fertility clinic. Others argue over their share of millions invested in business. Some squabble over visitation rights for the family pet.

Clients walk in with baggage and stress and heartache. Matrimonial law can be equal parts business valuations, tax and commercial litigation, psychology and child psychology. It is this last issue— the psychological impact of divorce on children—that Hendler still finds troublesome after all these years. He still sees situations where one party attempts to use a claim for sole custody as a bargaining tool to pay less in child support.

Varner

& Goundry is a professional corporation whose members and associates are trial lawyers specializing in personal injury defense, medical negligence defense, and administrative law as it relates to the privileges and licensing of physicians in the state of Maryland. Members of the firm are AV-rated by Martindale-Hubbell, the highest possible rating for legal ability and ethical standards.

Conrad Varner was recently named a fellow in the Litigation Counsel of America. He is a past chair of the Maryland Bar Association’s litigation section and past president of the Maryland Association of Defense Trial Counsel. He has served on numerous pro bono boards including the Maryland Disability Law Center, The ARC of Frederick and Washington County and the Legal Aid Bureau.

Ed Goundry graduated from the University of Baltimore School of Law in 1991 where he served as articles editor of the Law Review. He regularly tries jury trials and handles appeals in state and federal court. His practice consists of defending physicians in cases of alleged malpractice, defending personal injury actions, and serving as a court-appointed mediator. He is admitted to practice law in Maryland, the District of Columbia, and West Virginia.

Matt Fogelson, an associate in the firm, joined the practice in 2011. He graduated with honors from the University of Maryland School of Law where he served on the University of Maryland Law Journal of Race, Religion, Gender and Class. As a former trial and appellate lawyer for the Maryland Office of the Public Defender, Fogelson has experience in criminal defense.

“For me and most of the lawyers I deal
with, so many [couples] have already been
through couples’ counseling or individual
counseling,” Hendler says. “Often, by the
time they get to me, it’s too late.”
In one case, Hendler successfully helped
argue that a separated spouse shouldn’t
have to pay for her estranged husband’s
graduate school education. In another case,
he won a decision establishing that couples
with joint bank accounts become tenants in
common after divorce, each entitled to 50
percent of the account balance.

Modern technology has complicated relationships, and by extension, Hendler’s practice. The disenchanted seek affairs online. High school sweethearts and college beaus pop up on Facebook. Affairs are documented with cell phone records, Facebook postings, You Tube videos and emails. It is all fodder for divorce attorneys.

Hendler has also seen another shift: an emphasis on alternative dispute resolution in family law. He has embraced this change, too, attending a Harvard Negotiation Workshop, becoming certified in 2007 as an arbitrator

LEFT TO RIGHT: Conrad W. Varner*, Matthew H.
Fogelson, Frederick W. Goundry, III
*Selected to 2013 Maryland Super Lawyers

121 East Patrick St. Frederick, MD 21701 (301) 631-1800 vglaw.org

by the American Academy of Matrimonial
Lawyers and completing mediation training
sponsored by the Maryland State Bar
Association this past year.
He will still go to trial without hesitation.
But he also spells out why differences
should be resolved amicably.
“It allows couples to arrive at their
own decisions instead of having them
imposed,” he says. “It is often less
expensive and less stressful.”
HENDLER HAS STAYED ACTIVE IN THE

Maryland State Bar Association and
the American Academy of Matrimonial
Lawyers, a group with more than 1,600
lawyers across the country. “He takes his
professional life seriously,” says fellow
firm member David Rudow. “It is a public
service and it contributes to the well-being
of the bar as a whole.”
For 13 years, Hendler served as his
firm’s managing member, which included
everything from finding office space to
hiring personnel. Last July, he decided to
step down. A younger attorney, he felt,
should take the job.

Rudow describes Hendler as high-
energy, then adds, “If you are practicing
law at 70, you have to be high-energy.”
Hendler and his wife, Royce, have two
grown daughters and live in a townhouse in
Baltimore’s Canton neighborhood. It is an
old but fashionable part of the city, not far
from his workplace. Hendler likes to say that
his grandfather worked his fingers to the
bone so that he could move out of the city
and into the suburbs, while he worked his
fingers to the bone so that he could move
out of the suburbs and back into the city.

From his firm’s sixth-floor conference room in the center of town, Hendler points to another building that once housed Adelberg, Rudow, Dorf & Hendler. The firm does not often change locations. It also doesn’t often change members. Adelberg practiced law for 60 years and passed away in 1990. Rudow came to the firm seven years before Hendler and is still there. Another member, Paul Dorf, passed away in 2012. He was 86. He kept working until a few months before his death. He was in the office every day, in suit and tie, ready to go.