Weinberg & Schwartz, L.L.C.

Family law and nothing else since 1995

Weinberg & Schwartz, L.L.C. has practiced family law exclusively since 1995 in Columbia, Maryland. Three decades in one field is unusual in a market where many offices carry several unrelated departments. The firm represents clients in Howard County and across Maryland.

That single focus shapes what the client-facing pages cover. Divorce, child custody, child support and alimony sit at the centre. Property division, separation agreements, retirement orders and visitation and access appear alongside them as part of the same body of work.

In my opinion, the 1995 date carries real weight here. A firm that narrowed its scope early and kept it narrow has seen the same Maryland statutes and the same county courts change around it many times over.

The range of matters the firm handles

The published practice list runs to ten headings: divorce, adoption and guardianship, alimony, domestic violence, child custody, child support, collaborative family law, mediation, prenuptial and postnuptial agreements, and wills and power of attorney.

Protective orders and urgent matters

Domestic violence and protective orders appear as their own practice heading. Work of that kind moves on court timetables measured in days. A family law office that keeps it in-house handles both the emergency and the custody case that usually follows it.

Agreements written before and during marriage

The firm drafts prenuptial and postnuptial agreements. It also prepares wills and powers of attorney, which places some estate work inside a family law practice. Adoption and guardianship round out the list of matters the site describes.

Four routes to a resolution

Weinberg & Schwartz resolves matters through settlement negotiation, mediation, collaborative family law and litigation. Mediation and collaborative family law each get their own place on the practice menu, so both carry equal billing with the courtroom work.

Collaborative family law is a defined process in Maryland. Both parties and both lawyers sign an agreement to settle without going to court, and the lawyers step aside if the case ends up in litigation. A firm offering it commits to a method that can cost it the trial work.

The firm brings in outside professionals in accounting, mental health, business valuation and vocational assessment. Those disciplines map onto the harder parts of a divorce: valuing a closely held business, establishing what an underemployed spouse could earn, and putting evidence in front of a judge on a custody question.

The lawyers named on the site

Eight attorneys appear in the site's attorney menu. Jolie Gelman Weinberg and Marni B. Schwartz carry the names on the door, and Schwartz is identified as a partner.

Weinberg graduated from Ohio State University and took her Juris Doctor at Georgetown University Law Center, where she sat on the Georgetown Journal of Legal Ethics. Her work covers mediation, divorce and separation, family law, and alternative dispute resolution, and she drafts Qualified Domestic Relations Orders. Schwartz studied at the State University of New York at Albany and earned her Juris Doctor from American University, Washington College of Law, where she took part in the Criminal Justice Clinic. Her practice covers family law along with estate planning and probate.

Amos M. Whitney earned a juris doctor from the University of Maryland School of Law in 2009. He handles family law and divorce across Maryland, from amicable separations through custody matters to high-conflict divorce litigation. Ethan T. Dellinger graduated from the University of Pittsburgh School of Law in 2007 and practices family law.

Lisa M. Pryor studied at the University of Maryland School of Law and graduated in 2013. Her work covers divorce and separation, child custody, child support and domestic violence. Theodore F. Warner and Rachel M. Sodergreen both practice family law at the firm, as does Evagevelly Posadas.

What the credentials tell a prospective client

Two attorneys came through the University of Maryland School of Law, which means local training for a practice built on Maryland statute. Georgetown, American University and the University of Pittsburgh account for the other law degrees the site records. Graduation years of 2007, 2009 and 2013 put several of these lawyers more than a decade into practice.

Recognition from courts and the bar

Maryland courts appoint attorneys from Weinberg & Schwartz to serve as Interest Attorneys in high-conflict custody cases. That role belongs to the child, and a judge picks the lawyer. As a reviewer, I treat a court appointment as a stronger signal than anything a firm can say about itself, because someone outside the firm made the call.

The Maryland State Bar Association and other groups have asked the firm's attorneys to help train other lawyers in family law. Teaching invitations come from peers who already practice in the area.

Where the firm works

Howard County is the firm's home ground, and Columbia is the county seat of population if not of government. The firm lists work reaching Annapolis, Baltimore, Bethesda, Ellicott City, Rockville and Silver Spring, which covers the Baltimore and Washington suburban corridor.

Those jurisdictions sit in different circuit courts with their own scheduling practices and their own bench. A family lawyer working across that spread deals with several sets of local procedure.

The firm maintains pages on Facebook, X and LinkedIn. Its office sits in the Century Plaza West building on Little Patuxent Parkway in Columbia.

How to read this listing

Weinberg & Schwartz publishes eight attorney names, ten practice headings, four dispute-resolution methods and a 1995 start date. The site names schools and graduation years for five of the eight lawyers.

Individual attorney bios carry varying levels of detail, and the site records no titles beyond Schwartz's partnership. Anyone weighing the firm can verify the court appointment and bar teaching work through Maryland sources directly. The firm has handled Maryland family law and nothing else for thirty years.