www.law.uga.edu

David P. O'Brien

Director of Legal Career Services

A.B., Harvard University
J.D., Cornell University

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Biographical Information

David P. O'Brien joined Georgia Law in the fall of 2011 as its Legal Career Services director. In this role, O'Brien is responsible for the management of the Office of Legal Career Services, which includes overseeing on-campus interview programs and job fairs, administering fall and spring recruiting programs, maintaining a database of employment opportunities, assisting those interested in obtaining judicial clerkships, counseling Georgia Law students and alumni regarding their job search and career development and promoting the excellence of Georgia Law graduates in markets in the Southeast and beyond. 

O'Brien comes to UGA with nearly 20 years of experience as a practicing attorney in addition to having served as an adjunct professor at American University Washington College of Law, where he taught legal ethics and externship seminars.

He has represented individual and corporate clients in litigation in state and federal courts across the country, served as in-house counsel for a large financial services company and a major non-profit, and has managed teams of professionals as a senior manager.

O'Brien's areas of specialization include securities litigation, SEC enforcement matters, white collar criminal defense, complex commercial litigation and international and domestic family abduction law.

He has served as chief counsel for the Missing Children Division of the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children; as senior vice president and chief litigation counsel for Wachovia Securities, the nation's third largest securities broker-dealer at the time; and as special counsel for the law firm Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati in Palo Alto, Calif., and Reston, Va. 

O'Brien earned his bachelor's degree cum laude from Harvard University and his law degree cum laude from Cornell University, where he was a notes editor for the Cornell Journal of Law and Public Policy.

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