Bonnie E. Rabin, a founding partner in Cohen Rabin Stine Schumann LLP, is a sought-after trial and appellate lawyer who has concentrated exclusively in the field of matrimonial and family law practice for over 25 years. Ms. Rabin is renowned for her representation of clients with financially complicated and complex contested custody issues. In 2010, two of her clients won landmark victories in the Court of Appeals, New York's highest court. In 2017, one of her clients won a landmark ruling on the question, "Who is a mother?" in the trial court and in the First Department Appellate Division.
An outstanding trial lawyer, Ms. Rabin has an AV® Preeminent™ rating from Martindale Hubbell. She has appeared in New York State trial and appellate courts in complex litigation cases involving custody, support, visitation, equitable distribution, Hague Convention cases (Federal Court), and habeas corpus cases, among others. Ms. Rabin is a well-known champion of the rights of parents and children in non-traditional families.
Ms. Rabin spent ten years with the Juvenile Rights Division of the Legal Aid Society as a supervising Attorney in Charge of the Manhattan Trial Office, where she represented, supervised and trained other attorneys representing children in cases involving custody, adoption, paternity, termination of parental rights, abuse and neglect, etc. She has been appointed law guardian (attorney for the child) by the Courts of New York County in numerous and complex child custody proceedings.
Ms. Rabin has been a member or Chair of the matrimonial and family law committees and sections of the major bar associations, including the New York City Bar Association, the New York County Lawyers' Association, the New York State Bar Association and the New York Women's Bar Association, among others, and has been the Chair of the Children and the Law Committee of the New York City Bar Association.
Ms. Rabin regularly teaches CLE courses in the area of family law, custody, marriage equality, domestic violence, and children's rights under the auspices of law schools and the major bar associations and has been an Adjunct Professor of Law at Cardozo Law School where she has taught the Family Court Clinic. Ms. Rabin also lectures at Judicial Conferences, including the New York State Judicial Institute, in the Appellate Division and for the New York State Bar Association, among others.
Ms. Rabin has published articles on domestic violence, children's rights, marriage equality and other family law issues and is a founding member of the Center for Battered Women's Legal Services (1990), a director of Sanctuary for Families (1990-2002) and past Chair of the Legal Advisory Council (1996-2005).
