Wednesday, June 15, 2011
Page 3
Schnider Joins Levitt & Quinn Family Law Center Board
By a MetNews Staff Writer
Retired Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Robert A. Schnider has been selected to join the board of the Levitt & Quinn Family Law Center.
The non-profit organization, established in 1981, provides legal representation in family law matters to low-income families in Los Angeles County.
The center’s development director, Matthew J. Lynch, said Schnider, currently in private mediation and arbitration, was elected unanimously to join the board at a meeting Sunday.
Schnider said he supported the work of the center, because there is “a huge pool of litigants out there who need help in very challenging and vitally important family law areas,” and Levitt & Quinn “has always been there as a resource” for these individuals.
“Over the years when cases came into my court with Levitt & Quinn representation, it was like a godsend” and “I was so appreciative of the work that they do,” he said. The center was also “nice enough to give me an award some time back,” Schnider added.
Schnider retired from the bench in 2008 after nearly three decades in the Los Angeles Superior Court’s Family Law Department.
He first joined the court in 1981, when he was appointed as a commissioner. Then-Gov. Gray Davis appointed Schnider to a judgeship in 2002, and he went on to serve as supervising judge of the family law departments.
The judge graduated from Boalt Hall School of Law in 1970, and entered private practice in association with his father in Santa Monica the following year after earning admission to the State Bar. Schnider carried on the practice as a solo practitioner after his father’s death in 1975.
He was among the first group of lawyers to become certified family law specialists in 1979 when the State Bar created the designation, and also served as of counsel to Rosen, Rosen & Levitt in the year before he took the bench.
Schnider has been recipient of multiple awards from bar groups, including the Los Angeles County Bar Association’s Outstanding Jurist Award in 2000, and awards from the family law sections of the county bar, the Beverly Hills Bar Association, and the State Bar.
He has also served as an instructor for the Continuing Judicial Studies Program and as an adjunct professor at Loyola Law School.
Copyright 2011, Metropolitan News Company