Glenn C. Lewis

During a groundbreaking career that has spanned three decades, Glenn Lewis has achieved national acclaim as a trial attorney, law professor, television host, author, and public interest advocate.  Having completed a one-year term as the Virginia Bar Association’s 107^th president in January 2008, Mr. Lewis is renowned among colleagues and clients as an innovative, dedicated and formidable practitioner whose tireless activism continues to produce dramatic reform in Virginia’s justice system; particularly within the field of domestic relations and family law.

Recognized by Washingtonian magazine in each of its seven reviews as one of the national capital area’s best divorce lawyers and featured as the region’s elite family law attorney in Washington Business Journal’s “The Doyen of Divorce” feature, Mr. Lewis is one of the nation’s most sought-after practitioners in his field.  His peers in the family law and trial bars describe him as a brilliant strategist who has deployed masterful and incisive cross-examination skills in depositions and in the courtroom to produce a remarkable record of client satisfaction.  While he has tried cases in more than 25 states and the District of Columbia, Mr. Lewis is proudest of his extensive record of settling cases and preserving families.

Glenn Lewis’ reputation for excellence encompasses matters of ethics and character as well as skill.   From the numerous billion-dollar asset distribution disputes he has successfully resolved to the thousands of pro bono hours he has contributed to indigent representation, bar leadership, lawyer training and legal scholarship, Mr. Lewis has applied the same principles of fairness and comity – together with a relentless attention to detail and an unsurpassed commitment to the welfare of his clients. 

Bar Leader, Community Servant, Teacher and Mentor

The same values have driven Glenn Lewis’ deep commitment to causes such as equal access to the justice system; expanded diversity within legal profession’s leadership and regulatory organizations; and excellence in higher education.

Prior to assuming the presidency of the Virginia Bar Association for the 2007-2008 term, Mr. Lewis chaired that organization's Domestic Relations Section Council.  He also chaired the Virginia State Bar Family Law Section's Board of Governors and served the maximum two terms as a member of the Virginia State Bar Council, which serves as that organization's governing body (the Virginia State Bar licenses Virginia lawyers and governs their conduct while the Virginia Bar Association promotes the continued improvement of the legal profession).

Mr. Lewis additionally served eight years as a member of the American Bar Association House of Delegates and four years as chair of the Virginia State Bar's Special Committee on Access to Legal Services.  He has co-chaired the Virginia Bar Association's Coalition on Family Law Legislation since 1997.

Through these roles and a multiplicity of additional capacities, Mr. Lewis focused public attention upon the family law field, galvanizing the long-overdue reform of Virginia's child custody laws while transforming domestic relations practice into a central focus for the legal profession. 

As President of the Fairfax (VA) Bar Association in 1995-96, Glenn Lewis pioneered initiatives to streamline dockets and ensure quality representation for the least fortunate among us, leading Fairfax County to create cutting-edge systems that are admired and emulated across America.  He chaired the first Pro Bono Task force, enlisting eminent domestic relations attorneys and their firms in a major effort to eliminate severe backlogs in family and domestic violence dockets.  In 1997, the Virginia State Bar honored Mr. Lewis for his efforts with its 2^nd Annual Local Bar Leader of the Year Award.

Also during his transformational Fairfax Bar presidency, Mr. Lewis established the Diversity Task Force and Minority Outreach Program, which earned him the Virginia State Bar's Award of Merit in 1996 and Fairfax County's 20^th Annual Human Rights Award in 1997.  That same year, the Asian American Bar Assocation issued a special recognition honoring Mr. Lewis for his “Superlative Effort In Inspiring and Promoting” that organization as its only non-Asian co-founder.

Mr. Lewis has invested tremendous energy into molding future generations of lawyers while ensuring the enhanced professionalism and quality training of current practitioners.   He is an Adjunct Professor at George Mason University School of Law, teaching courses in trial advocacy and family law.  He also serves as Charter Faculty and Director of the Virginia College of Trial Advocacy, located at The College of William and Mary's Marshall-Wythe School of Law.

Mr. Lewis has made prolific contributions to continuing legal education programs as an author and lecturer.   He served the maximum permitted number of terms as faculty for Virginia's Mandatory Course on Professionalism and as a member of the founding committee and initial faculty of Virginia's Professionalism Course for Law Students; an initiative that reaches all Virginia law schools.  In 2001, Mr. Lewis played a key role in producing a new video for the Mandatory Course on Professionalism, which replaced the prior recording the Course had utilized since 1987.  Devoting over 150 hours to this effort, Mr. Lewis provided on-camera and voice-over narration while assisting with research, production, scriptwriting, and editing.  The Virginia Law Foundation honored Mr. Lewis' contributions to continuing legal education in 2006, presenting him with the Gardener G. DeMallie, Jr. Continuing Legal Education Award.