From: Ft. Wainwright, Alaska

Our February 2008 Member of the Month and State Chair for the Military, James Wherry, has a truly unique job.  Jim serves as the Department of the Army Civilian Legal Assistance attorney at Ft. Wainwright in Fairbanks Alaska.  The community includes more than 6,000 service members and their dependents, as well as many military retirees.

Prior to taking that position, Jim was a civilian bankruptcy attorney in Rock Island, Illinois and Davenport, Iowa for fourteen years.  That experience gave him a great foundation in consumer law.  In his current position, Jim sees as many as 8 to 10 new clients every day, and about one-third of the cases are consumer law issues including bankruptcy, identity theft, warranty violations, landlord-tenant problems and debtor-creditor issues.

Jim began his legal career in 1991 as a Law Clerk to the Honorable Judge William L. Edmonds, U.S. Bankruptcy Court, N.D. Iowa.  In 1992, he returned to Davenport and opened a solo practice.  Gradually, his law practice focused on criminal law, family law, and bankruptcy.  He litigated contested matters in bankruptcy court on a monthly basis in Iowa and Illinois and conducted trials in state and federal courts.  His practice was complex, and he has appealed cases to the Eighth Circuit Bankruptcy Appellate Panel, Tatge v. Tatge (In re Tatge), 212 B.R. 604 (8th Cir. BAP 1997), and to the Eighth Circuit, Metrobank v. Trimble (In re Trimble), 50 F.3d 530 (8th Cir 1995).

Jim has lectured extensively on bankruptcy law at the U.S. Army’s Judge Advocate General’s Legal Center and School in Charlottesville, Virginia and has spoken on military law and bankruptcy at NACBA’s annual convention in 2007. 

Currently, he is teaching a "Financial Management" course to new soldiers. He invites all NACBA members to share with him “any good ideas as to what they see as the biggest problems for soldiers.” Just send Jim an email.

Jim graduated with a degree in history from Augustana College (Rock Island, Illinois) in 1987.  He then graduated from the University of Iowa College of Law in 1991.  One of the most important influences of his legal career was Professor Patrick Bauer, the debtor-creditor and bankruptcy law professor at the University of Iowa, who had “a deep understanding and compassion for debtors in bankruptcy and a memory that can survey and remember Iowa foreclosure law for the past 180 years and U.S. Bankruptcy law for the past 100 years.”  His skill really inspired Jim to learn and understand debtor-creditor and bankruptcy law.

Jim had been a member of the National Association of Chapter Thirteen Trustees since the early 1990’s. His friends who had been long-time NACBA members, including Joel Deutsch and Penny Souhrada, encouraged him to join NACBA.  Since then, Jim has been to several Annual Conventions and Fall workshops, and was a presenter at the 15th Annual Convention in Philadelphia, where he, Lynn Drysdale, and Angela Martin presented a paper and lecture entitled Military Members Deep in Debt!  In his free time, Jim keeps up on NACBA events from his home in Alaska as NACBA’s State Chair for the Military. He invites any NACBA member to contact him with questions about the military, including questions about military pay and about the Service members’ Civil Relief Act.

Jim serves as a Captain in the U.S. Army Reserve with the 448th Civil Affairs Battalion in Tacoma, Washington.  They anticipate mobilizing and deploying again, at some point in the future.  Their work focuses on community development including schools, water projects, medical clinics and veterinary care.  Prior to joining the Army as a Department of the Army civilian, Jim served as a volunteer pro bono attorney for Prairie State Legal Services in Rock Island, Illinois and HELP Legal Services in Davenport, Iowa.

Jim has some advice for NACBA members vis-à-vis assisting members of the military: “The best thing any NACBA attorney can do is to contact their local military post and let them know that they are STILL IN PRACTICE post-BAPCPA.  In Fairbanks, Alaska, most consumer bankruptcy attorneys left the practice after 2005.  Army regulations do not permit Judge Advocates and DA Civilian attorneys to prefer one attorney over another in making referrals, but they are permitted to let service members know about the areas of law that an outside attorney practices in and whether that attorney offers free initial consultations, military discounts, or some pro bono work for service members.”