Aram Desteian and Jessica Kometz have been recognized as 2021 Up & Coming Attorneys by Minnesota Lawyer.

Aram Desteian represents businesses in complex commercial litigation, and also counsels and defends other lawyers against a spectrum of professional liability claims. His commercial litigation practice includes representing businesses in a wide range of business disputes. Aram was an integral member in the Syngenta Litigation, a multi-jurisdictional complex litigation involving more than 68,000 claims in Minnesota state court, as well as numerous claims venued in the U.S. District Courts for the Districts of Kansas and Illinois. All the Syngenta cases were resolved as part of a global settlement class resulting in a settlement amount of more than $1 billion.

As a professional liability attorney, Aram regularly helps other lawyers prevent and navigate lawsuits, investigations, board proceedings, and hearings involving legal ethics, legal malpractice, and other areas relating to the law of lawyering. He has published many scholarly articles and is a frequent presenter on topics relating to legal ethics and professional responsibility. He is a member of the Hennepin County Bar Association (HCBA) Professionalism and Ethics Section and serves as its liaison to the HCBA Awards Committee. Aram is also a member of the Minnesota State Bar Association Rules of Professional Regulation Committee. Aram serves as Bassford Remele's Associate General Counsel.

Jessica Kometz regularly assists families, businesses, and individuals in maneuvering through trust and estate conflicts and additionally focuses her practice in the areas of employment law and commercial litigation.

In her trusts and estates practice, Jessica works with trust beneficiaries, trustees, and other fiduciaries in resolving will and trust conflicts and petitions for guardianship and/or conservatorship. Jessica was part of a team that successfully litigated the question of where a decedent would be buried. She represented a nominated personal representative in seeking appointment when the decedent had only signed the self-proved affidavit portion of a will.

In her employment practice, Jessica advises and represents clients in a wide spectrum of concerns, such as navigating reasonable accommodation requests, and has successfully defended harassment and discrimination claims in court and with various administrative agencies. She recently received her Civil Rights Investigator, Foundations Certification, from the Association of Title IX Administrators (ATIXA). Jessica was part of a team who successfully represented a large corporation in an investigation by the Minneapolis Department of Civil Rights involving race and religious discrimination claims. She also represented a large corporation in an investigation by the St. Paul Department of Human Rights and Equal Economic Opportunity involving disability, national origin, and public assistance discrimination claims.

Bassford Remele | July 20, 2021