Dan C O'Connell

Named the 2015 Minneapolis Area Family Law “Lawyer of the Year” by Best Lawyers in America, Dan O’Connell has been guiding clients through the legal system for 30 years. Only a single lawyer in each practice area in each community is honored as the “Lawyer of the Year”. He helps his clients overcome the fear and uncertainty of divorce. He works hard to help his clients achieve a fair and amicable settlement, but if there is not a fair settlement to be had, Mr. O’Connell is a skilled trial attorney who will take the case to trial.

He helps clients make marriage dissolution decisions out of their highest aspirations instead of their worst fears and impulses. Dan is also a licensed CPA, so is able to understand, negotiate, and litigate complex financial and tax issues, business valuations, retirement, executive compensation, intellectual property, and other business issues, as well as non-marital asset issues. He has handled pre-marital and post-marital agreements, as well as cohabitation agreements. He represents clients in child custody, parenting time, grandparent visitation, and third-party custody/parenting time matters.

Dan’s calming demeanor and empathetic manner help him assist clients and lawyers toward amicable and dignified resolutions through ADR. He is also named by Best Lawyers in America for Family Law Mediation. Dan has been appointed by the courts to act as a neutral evaluator in dozens of cases involving financial issues and custody and parenting time issues. He is an arbitrator and CSM (private judge). He is a fellow in the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers (AAML) and a member of the Collaborative Law Institute and the Association of Family and Conciliation Courts. He is immediate past president of the Minnesota Chapter of the AAML. Dan practices law regularly in Ramsey, Hennepin, Washington, and Dakota counties, but has had cases in many other counties throughout Minnesota.

He mediates both civil law and family law disputes. He has represented lawyers, doctors, dentists and other professionals in licensing and ethics matters for over twenty-five years.