Gabrielle Angelita Best Husband

Ms. Best Husband is grateful for the experience she had as a judicial clerk, which underscored the great importance of fairness, compassion, and empathy. Family law is a branch of the legal tree that assumes compassion on the part of the attorney. Litigation and advocacy imply smart, hard-working lawyers, but the really critical area in family law, in Fairfax divorce attorney Gabrielle A. Best Husband’s opinion, is client counselling; it almost always involves dealing with clients during a stressful, emotionally demanding time of their lives.

Having wanted to help people for as long as she can remember, Ms. Best Husband naturally gravitated towards family law, which provides opportunities to combine her desire to litigate with her passion to counsel and contribute in an immediate, direct way to the improvement of individual lives. “Family law is fraught with emotional turmoil, particularly where children are involved,” she said. “An understanding of human nature and a passion for justice facilitate the finding of workable solutions, which are in the b est interest of all concerned, particularly the children.”

She is able to leverage that experience when interacting with the type of client one meets when dealing with family law, especially in cases involving custody. “Whether it be merely in having discussions with my clients regarding co-parenting, negotiating a settlement agreement, or advocating for my client in front of the judge, I feel I am being given a priceless opportunity to provide for my clients the kind of effective representation that can truly improve their situation,” she said. Born and raised on an island that boasts a multiplicity of races and ethnicities co-existing harmoniously in a shared space, Ms. Best Husband is used to interfacing with people who share neither her racial nor her cultural attributes.

That resultant cultural diversity helps her not only relate to a wide and varied spectrum of clients, but also helps when she is issue spotting and/or negotiating on behalf of her client. “It is my cultural diversity that has on many occasions allowed me easily to identify and understand the other party’s position and thus facilitate the crafting of a solution workable for both parties,” she said. The thing Ms. Best Husband always stresses to her clients is that their best interests will always be served by their being completely frank and truthful with her. She tells them that it is just as important for them to tell her the whole truth as it is for her to tell them the truth and be honest and forthright with them rather than tell them what they want to hear. She makes sure they understand that no responsible person is a “yes” person who will avoid having tough conversations with them.

“I tell clients that my priority has to be to ensure I minimize legal risks,” she said. “And I reiterate that I will always be supportive and be there for them because the process will sometimes be emotionally quite draining.”