Title IX Informal Resolution, including Mediation.

Bert is one of the two co-founding members of BartlettJames LLC. He serves on our Executive Committee. In addition to serving as an experienced Title IX investigator and administrative decision maker, Bert is also responsible for administration of the firm’s personnel and fiscal matters. He enjoys a national reputation as one of the preeminent trial attorneys in America, with vast courtroom and jury experiences that few can equal. He has served more than 35 years as a prosecutor, defense counsel or judge in administrative, civil and criminal matters involving the military, state and federal courts, and courts overseas. Bert is based in North Carolina.

Bert is retired from the U.S. Marine Corps, where he served for 22 years as a career infantry officer and judge advocate. Upon his retirement, he served as an Assistant Attorney General for the State of North Carolina, before going into private practice in 2000. He has participated as either the prosecutor or defense counsel or judge in more than 750 jury trials and in more than 14,000 criminal cases, while he has supervised subordinate counsel and judges in many thousands more matters. As a military judge, he presided over several highly-publicized trials of national and international interest, including the 1998-99 court-martial of a Marine pilot for the deaths of 20 people in the Italian Alps, after a jet flew through a gondola cable and dropped them 356 feet to their deaths. Bert was also retained by the Associated Press to help defend Bilal Hussein, a Pulitzer Prize-winning photojournalist held by the U.S. military in Iraq as a terrorist. He and his team fought those allegations in the Central Criminal Courts of Iraq in Baghdad, ultimately securing Mr. Hussein’s release in April, 2008.

Bert has held above top secret clearances in the military and has participated or lead multiple investigations with Congressional and/or National Command Authority (NCA) interest. He is also a frequent lecturer on ethics, professionalism, and trial advocacy, and he has participated in more than 20 officer-involved-shootings (OIS) investigations.

Bert is a Distinguished Graduate of the University of Kansas with a Bachelors of Arts degree in Political Science and a Distinguished Graduate of the University of Kansas School of Law (Order of the Coif), where he served as an editor on both the Kansas Law Review and the Kansas Criminal Procedure Review. He holds an LL.M., with distinction, in Military Law with a Criminal Law Specialty, from The Judge Advocate General’s School, U.S. Army, in Charlottesville, Virginia. Bert was also the Distinguished Graduate of the 38^th Military Judges Course.

Margaret has conducted countless Title IX investigations. The wisdom and experienced she earned during her highly-distinguished career routinely proves invaluable to our higher education clients. She enjoyed more than 30 years of service as the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of North Carolina, as a renown legal educator and law school administrator, and as a staff member for a United States Senator. She has also served on multiple boards of directors and engaged in a private law practice representing clients before state and federal administrative agencies. Margaret is based in North Carolina.

For more than 30 years, Margaret served the Campbell University School of Law in myriad capacities. She taught a wide variety of subjects with immediate relevance to clients of BartlettJames, while also serving as the Associate Dean for Academic, Student and Administrative Affairs, as an Assistant Dean for External Relations, and as the founding Director of Campbell’s nationally-recognized Externship Program. Margaret has served as lead investigator in numerous Title IX investigations for numerous university clients. Likewise, she has presented Title IX educational programs to several higher education clients. She has also conducted specialized investigations into matters involving the sexual mistreatment of minors.

Of significant note, Margaret was appointed by the President, confirmed by the U.S. Senate, and served as the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of North Carolina for five years—a position as the chief federal attorney for civil and criminal matters in 44 out of the 100 counties in North Carolina. Subsequent to that position, she has continued her federal work by serving in the National Association of Former United States Attorneys (NAFUSA) for the past three decades, including several terms on its Board of Directors and all the offices in its leadership chain, culminating with President in 2003-2004.

In addition to her work in legal education and as a United States Attorney, Margaret has also served for the past ten years on the North Carolina Rules Review Commission, including stints as the Chairman and First Vice-Chairman. The Rules Review Commission is the state agency created by the General Assembly to review and approve rules adopted by State of North Carolina agencies. She further serves or has served on multiple Boards of Directors for the North Carolina Bar Association and the Wake County Bar Association/10^th Judicial District Bar, while also serving on and chairing the Wake County Board of Elections. In recognition of her exemplary service to the State of North Carolina and her community, Margaret was awarded the Order of the Long Leaf Pine, the most prestigious award conferred by the Governor of North Carolina.

Margaret received her undergraduate education at Meredith College in Raleigh, North Carolina, and graduated, with Honors, from the Campbell University School of Law, currently in Raleigh, North Carolina, where she was a member of the Campbell University Law Review Editorial Board. Margaret also has engaged in graduate legal studies at the Georgetown University Law Center in Washington, D.C.

Bruce serves our clientele as a highly experienced Title IX Decision Maker and informal resolution mediator. His talents as an investigator and analyst were honed over the course of his distinguished 38 year career as an Assistant United States Attorney, an Assistant State Attorney General in North Carolina, and as a highly-regarded Judge Advocate in the United States Air Force. Bruce is based in Florida.

After law school, Bruce prosecuted cases in the Mercer County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office in Princeton, West Virginia for four years. Bruce left West Virginia to join the U.S. Air Force as a Judge Advocate, where he served on active duty for eight years, including a tour as a Circuit Counsel prosecuting dozens of courts-martial at over 20 bases in multiple states. After leaving active duty, Bruce served five years as an Assistant Attorney General for the State of North Carolina, assigned to the Mental Health Section of the Division of Health and Human Services. While there he represented the state in state and federal courts in contested personnel cases and in alleged civil rights violations and whistleblower retaliation allegations, among many complaints. Bruce then joined the U.S. Attorney’s office in Orlando, Florida, where he served as an Assistant U.S. Attorney for 16 years prior to retirement. While there, among many complex cases, he lead a multi-agency task force that prosecuted a Ponzi scheme operator who bilked thousands of investors out of more than $200 million dollars and convicted 42 members of a multi-level cocaine smuggling conspiracy. He also successfully prosecuted two federal correctional officers for bribing a federal inmate to assault another inmate, resulting in the latter’s death.

After leaving active duty in the Air Force and concurrent with his civilian career, Bruce continued to serve as a Judge Advocate in the U.S. Air Force Reserve. He was an instructor and featured lecturer at the Air Force Judge Advocate General’s School for over a decade in the 1990s, teaching basic and advanced litigation courses each year, and he served a tour as a military judge. He also earned extensive management experience while serving as the Senior Reserve Judge Advocate in three major commands (Special Operations Command, Space Command, and Air Combat Command) where he supervised scores of junior military attorneys at bases throughout the country. In 2012, Bruce was hand-picked to serve as the Chief of Staff and Staff Judge Advocate at U.S. Central Command’s Office of the Defense Representative for Pakistan, located in the U.S. Embassy, Islamabad, Pakistan. While there, Bruce was the leader of a U.S. inter-agency team negotiating an agreement with the Government of Pakistan to permit the transit of U.S. and NATO supplies into and out of Afghanistan across Pakistan territory. For his significant accomplishments during this last tour, the Secretary of Defense awarded Bruce the Defense Superior Service Medal, the second highest peace-time award in the Department of Defense.

Bruce graduated from Duke University with a Bachelor of Arts degree, with Honors, majoring in Political Science and History. He is a graduate of West Virginia University College of Law.