Mitchell Bernard is NRDC's litigation director. At NRDC, he has successfully litigated water, air, toxics, and environmental justice cases against Texaco, Mallinckrodt, Duke Energy, and a variety of government agencies. From 1995-98, as a monitor appointed by United States District Judge John S. Martin, Jr., he oversaw the creation and implementation of an environmental compliance program at Con Edison. He later served as a consultant to the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York. He is a graduate of Princeton University and New York University School of Law, where he was a Hays Civil Liberties Fellow. He was a law clerk in the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.

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Aaron Colangelo is a senior attorney with NRDC’s Litigation Team in DC. Aaron has litigated cases regarding coastal water quality, farmworker exposure to pesticides, and toxic chemicals in children’s toys and other consumer products. Aaron also teaches an environmental protection clinic at Howard University School of Law. Before joining NRDC in 2001, Aaron worked as a litigation associate at Covington & Burling. Aaron graduated from Penn State University and Harvard Law School.

Selena Kyle is an attorney on the Litigation Team in San Francisco. Her current docket includes actions to abate toxic contamination from a rural Tennessee landfill, stormwater pollution in Los Angeles County, and overfishing of Pacific groundfish. Selena has also supported litigation to strengthen nationwide monitoring for lead in the ambient air; to protect the delta smelt from risks of extinction posed by federal and state water projects in California; and to conserve wilderness-quality lands in the Sierra Nevada. Before joining NRDC, Selena clerked for Judge Susan Dlott on the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Ohio. She holds a J.D. from Stanford Law School and bachelor’s degrees in Economics and Urban Studies from Stanford University.

Benjamin Longstreth is a senior attorney with NRDC's Litigation Team in DC. At NRDC, Ben has litigated cases involving hazardous air emissions from a proposed coal plant in North Carolina, protection of wetlands in Florida, greenhouse gas regulations, ozone protection and energy efficiency. Before joining NRDC, Ben served in the U.S. Department of Justice, Environmental and Natural Resources Division and clerked for Chief Judge John M. Walker of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals. He graduated from Williams College and Columbia Law School. Between college and law school, he worked on environmental policy for the NY/NJ Baykeeper.

Nancy Marks is a senior attorney in the New York office, where she has worked since 1986. She litigates citizen suits nationally, focusing on air and water pollution, hazardous wastes, and environmental injustices. Nancy also co-directs NRDC’s environmental law clinic with New York University School of Law. She holds degrees in geology from Williams College and Stanford University and is a 1983 graduate of Harvard Law School. Prior to joining NRDC in New York, Nancy served two years in the environmental protection division of the Massachusetts attorney general’s office, and spent one year as a legal fellow in NRDC’s San Francisco office.

Nick Morales has joined the litigation team in the Washington, D.C. office as the 2011-2013 Schwarz Litigation Fellow.  Nick previously clerked with Judge Norman K. Moon on the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Virginia and interned at the Environmental Defense Section of the Environment and Natural Resources Division of the Department of Justice.  Nick received his undergraduate degree from the University of Richmond and his law degree from Harvard, where he served as a senior editor on the Harvard Environmental Law Review and represented clients through the Environmental Law and Policy Clinic and the Disability Law Clinic.

Cassie Marlantes Rahm is a Beagle Fellow and a member of the Litigation Team in the New York office.  She received her undergraduate and law degrees from Harvard University, and during law school served as an editor on the Harvard Law Review.  Prior to joining NRDC, Cassie worked as a litigation associate at WilmerHale and clerked for Judge Pierre N. Leval on the Second Circuit Court of Appeals.

Andres Restrepo is a Beagle Fellow and a member of the Litigation Team in Washington, D.C. He recevied his B.A. from Stanford University and his J.D. from Harvard Law School, where he served as an editor of the Harvard Law & Policy Review and vice-president of the American Constitution Society. Prior to joining NRDC, he worked as a litigation intern at the U.S. Department of Justice’s Civil Division and at U.S. Attorney’s Offices in San Jose and Boston.

Lucía Roibal is the litigation assistant for the litigation team in the New York office. Previously, Lucía worked as a paralegal for a New York law firm and interned at the SouthWest Organizing Project, a community organization that promotes social, economic, and environmental justice. She holds a bachelor’s degree from Barnard College, where she majored in Spanish and Latin American Cultures and minored in Environmental Science.

Aaron Schaer has rejoined the NRDC staff as litigation assistant for the litigation team in the DC office. Aaron previously worked with us as an intern supporting the science center. He holds BA degrees in International Relations and in Political Theory and Constitutional Democracy -- both from Michigan State University, James Madison College.

Joya Sonnenfeldt is the litigation assistant for the litigation team in San Francisco. She attended Williams College, where she graduated with majors in History and Environmental Policy. During college, Joya held summer internships with the Law and Policy Section of the Environment and Natural Resources Division of the Department of Justice, Cerberus Capital Management and the Synergos Institute.

Jen Sorenson has joined the litigation team in San Francisco as the 2010-2012 Koob Litigation Fellow. Jen received her JD from Yale, her BA in English from Wesleyan, and clerked for Judge Berzon.  Jen summered at both Earthjustice and DOJ’s Environmental Crimes Section and, during the term, sharpened her teeth at Yale’s environmental law clinic and community and economic development clinic.

Michael Wall is a senior Litigation Team attorney in San Francisco. He represented plaintiffs in litigation that held Friant Dam’s destruction of San Joaquin River fisheries to be illegal; in two trials to protect delta smelt and Chinook salmon from unlawful water diversion by the Central Valley Project; and in a case that forced the federal government to stop storing and discharging hazardous waste from the Suisun Bay “ghost fleet.”  Before joining NRDC, he served in the U.S. Department of Justice, Environment Division, and practiced at a San Francisco firm.  He graduated from Harvard College and Harvard Law School and clerked on the Eleventh Circuit.