Daniel Riviera - Sebastopol, CA

Daniel Riviera is a Harvard and Georgetown-educated lawyer and mediator, practicing exclusively in the area of family law. He works with parties seeking a way through conflict to a fully informed, fair resolution. Divorce is a major life transition, and for many a difficult process, with practical, emotional, and financial challenges. Daniel has the temperament, expertise, and judgment to guide parties, whether as a lawyer or mediator, to a positive result from which they can begin the next chapter of their lives.

Daniel was a transactional lawyer, with occasional involvement in litigation, first in Los Angeles and then in San Francisco, for more than 20 years. His emphasis as a transactional lawyer was entertainment, intellectual property, new ventures, and business. His clients included world-famous companies and individuals.

Following the conclusion of an arbitration in which Daniel represented one of the parties, the organization conducting the arbitration approached Daniel to become a mediator. Daniel underwent training, became deeply engaged with the role of the mediator and the process of consensual dispute resolution, and in the ensuing years mediated intensively in a wide variety of subject matter areas as an adjunct to his law practice. In that time, he guided more than 1,000 conflicts to resolution.

From the outset of his dispute-resolution career, Daniel has worked extensively in family law, drawn by the blend of legal, financial, and emotional elements and the range of consensual dispute-resolution processes employed in the field, including interdisciplinary formats – like "collaborative practice" and "integrative mediation" – involving mental health, financial, and other professionals.

Beginning in 2012, Daniel refocused his practice to emphasize consensual dispute resolution in family law, primarily "settlement-minded" single-party legal representation and mediation, where Daniel serves as a neutral mediator between the parties either for the entire dissolution process or for the resolution of particular issues. When required as an attorney, Daniel is a highly effective advocate in his writing and appearances in court in connection with litigated issues.

In addition to representing individual parties as an attorney or working with both parties as a mediator, Daniel serves as a consulting attorney to individual parties engaged in mediation with another mediator.

Daniel is well-suited to both roles of attorney and mediator. He is empathetic, patient, and supportive. He is calm and steady, and a careful listener. He has decades of experience zealously and successfully representing individuals at a high level, many of whom must maintain ongoing relationships with the other party (as when divorcing parents must continue to raise children together). Daniel has the maturity, perspective, and judgment to help clients evaluate choices clearly and make constructive decisions. His work as a mediator in dozens of settlement conferences informs both his counsel as a lawyer and his guidance as a mediator in that he knows how many other cases with like issues have been resolved.

Daniel has a deep and long-standing commitment to pro bono service in his communities and engagement in leadership positions with professional organizations. He has served extensively as a settlement conference panelist and judge pro tem in the Family Law Department of Marin County Superior Court. He has mediated hundreds of cases in multiple subject matter areas for the Sonoma County Superior Court. Daniel is a past president of Integrative Mediation Bay Area; and a past member of the boards of directors of The Mediation Society and of Collaborative Practice North Bay. He is a member of the Marin County, Sonoma County, and Beverly Hills Bar Associations.

In 2017, Daniel received a Pro Bono Award for his work in mediation from the Sonoma County Bar Association. He is a graduate of Harvard College and Georgetown University Law Center.