Bryan is an attorney at UnitedHealthcare’s legal department supporting the company’s Legal Risk Management teams. Bryan has been a volunteer with CLC for three years and has represented five clients.

CLC would like to recognize how extremely dedicated Bryan is to his CLC clients. His unintended and unique specialty with CLC is representing sibling sets. Bryan is very good at advocating for all of his clients needs, getting to know his clients and communicating with all the parties on a case to ensure his clients’ wishes are realized.

Representing sibling sets is often complex and requires travel to visit each sibling when they are placed in separate places. Bryan consistently meets with his clients despite that his clients are in different placements – at one point, one of his clients was placed 150 miles away from Bryan in Duluth.

Bryan’s first case with CLC involved a sister and brother who wanted to live together. They were placed in different placements throughout the majority of the case. Bryan strongly advocated that the county go back and explore a kinship placement where his clients could possibly reside together permanently. Due to Bryan’s zealous efforts, his clients’ wishes were granted. The court transferred custody of both his clients to an individual that his clients consider kin. They live happily together after being placed apart while in the foster care system.

Currently, Bryan represents a sibling set of three clients. In this case, Bryan brilliantly juggles the needs of all three children. The siblings are happy in separate placements, but require advocacy to ensure that they have and will continue to have contact. This past November, Bryan participated in a termination of parental rights trial for this case, which will be reviewed by the Minnesota Court of Appeals later this year.

Bryan was awarded the 2012 UHG Chief Legal Officer’s Pro Bono Award for the work he has done with CLC and other pro bono clients. This award was conferred by UnitedHealth Group’s CLO on the volunteer with the most pro bono hours for this past year. As a part of this award, UHG’s CLO donated $5000 to the organization of Bryan’s choice. As Bryan put it, “naturally, I chose Children’s Law Center of Minnesota.” Bryan tells us he “feels blessed to be a part of the mission and the work at CLC,” but CLC feels blessed to have Bryan as a volunteer. Thank you, Bryan!