Meet the Freelance Attorney

Lauren Joseph Wolongevicz is a freelance attorney providing contract legal research and appellate level brief writing for criminal and civil appeals. She also offers trial consulting services for appellate level preservation, review, and preparation. She additionally drafts trial motions with an eye towards appellate preservation and issue-spotting. Lauren has extensive experience in appellate practice having been the attorney of record in over 90 cases in New Mexico’s appellate courts and working closely with judges in the state supreme court and court of appeals as an extern and judicial law clerk. She has also briefed civil and criminal appeals in the United States Supreme Court, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, the Alabama Court of Appeals, the California Court of Appeals, the California Supreme Court, the  Colorado Court of Appeals, the Florida Court of Appeals, the Georgia Court of Appeals, the Massachusetts Court of Appeals, the Ohio Court of Appeals, and the Washington Court of Appeals.

Before becoming a freelance attorney, Lauren was an Assistant Attorney General at the New Mexico Office of the Attorney General in the Criminal Appeals Division, where she handled everything from misdemeanor drug possession cases to complex homicide appeals. 

Prior to representing the state in criminal appeals, Lauren clerked for the Honorable Chief Judge Linda M. Vanzi on the New Mexico Court of Appeals. As Chief Judge Vanzi’s clerk, Lauren drafted civil and criminal appellate opinions that included, but were not limited to, legal matters concerning negligence and the standard of care, sovereign immunity, the Tort Claims Act, wills and trusts, child custody, the Kinship Guardianship Act, the Abuse and Neglect Act, the Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction Enforcement Act, termination of parental rights, the Federal Immigration and Nationality Act, the Medical Malpractice Act, uninsured/underinsured motorist insurance contracts, foreclosure redemption, foreclosure standing, the Uniform Commercial Code, children’s court matters, and numerous criminal case issues.

Lauren graduated from Denver University’s Sturm College of Law in the top 10% of her class as a member of the Order of the Coif and received several scholastic excellence awards for obtaining the highest grade in a class. She received the Hartje Objective Writing Award for writing the best objective brief in her legal writing course. In addition, Lauren served as the Tenth Circuit Survey Editor for the Denver University Law Review and a staff editor for the school’s water law review. While visiting the University of New Mexico School of Law, she interned for the Honorable Chief Justice Charles W. Daniels at the New Mexico Supreme Court.

In her past life, Lauren was an Adventure Based Counselor, Emergency Medical Technician (EMT), and Wilderness First Responder. She grew up outside Boston, Massachusetts and met her future husband in Albuquerque while they were both attending classes at the University of New Mexico, even though he grew up less than an hour from her childhood home in Massachusetts. Lauren and her husband Jim enjoy hiking and backpacking, but these days get their exercise keeping up with their three children Aaron, Leah, and Jayden. 

Lauren Joseph Wolongevicz