Her family law practice focuses on matrimonial litigation, including dissolutions involving complex discovery and valuation issues, child custody disputes, and modifications of child support and parenting plans.
Gail Wahrenberger knew when she graduated from the University of Oregon Law School in 1985 that there was one type of law that she didn't want to practice: divorce law. So, Gail began her legal career as a commercial litigator, handling most kinds of litigation from contract claims to trademark infringements, bankruptcies and probates. And then one day, her boutique law firm took a divorce case and assigned Gail to handle it. For the first time, Gail felt like what she did mattered. She took a second divorce case, and seven years into practicing law, Gail knew that she had found her niche. Gail has worked in divorce law, exclusively, since coming to Stokes Lawrence in 1992.
Gail believes that as a divorce lawyer, she handles the most sensitive and critical litigation that many people ever experience in their lives. The subject matter is critical: how often will a parent get to be with his or her children; how enforceable is a prenuptial agreement signed twenty years ago; how will the minority interest in the family business be valued; how do we divide restricted stock. And this subject matter often plays out against the emotional backdrop of ending an intimate relationship - sometimes before one party is ready for change, sometimes laced with drug or alcohol issues, sometimes with the presence of a new romantic interest - all creating a need for special handling and understanding.
Bad marriages can still result in good divorces, and that is Gail's goal. Armed with expert analysis, Gail is creative and practical. Gail uses mediation and arbitration when appropriate but is fully prepared, when settlement negotiations fail, to go to trial. She has tried cases involving business valuations, maintenance, child support, meretricious relationships, parenting plans, the impact of domestic violence on a parenting plan, relocation, and the enforceability of prenuptial agreements. Because the financial and emotional toll of trial is significant, trial is a course of last resort.
Gail has been recognized as an exceptional divorce lawyer through being named a Super Lawyer (top 1% of lawyers in the state) and as a top divorce lawyer by Washington CEO Magazine. She has provided legal advice to low income people through the neighborhood legal clinics for about twenty years. When she is not practicing law she is often talking about it with her husband and oldest son, both of whom are also lawyers. Gail has a daughter at the University of Oregon and a son who is working on "finding himself". Gail's two year old granddaughter is the light of her life.
CONTACT INFO
206-626-6000
gail.wahrenberger@stokeslaw.com
PRACTICE AREAS
EDUCATION
University of Oregon, J.D. (1985)
Oregon State University, B.A. (1976)
ADMITTED TO PRACTICE
Washington (1985)
ASSISTANT
