*Licensed in California and Massachusetts – Currently manages our Massachusetts offices and oversees Wilkinson & Finkbeiner’s offices in San Diego, Irvine, and Los Angeles.

Fellow, American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers (AAML)

Certified National Board of Trial Advocacy (Family Trial Law)

David Wilkinson received his Bachelor of Arts degree in Business Administration from the University of Washington, one of the highest ranked undergraduate business schools in the United States, where he was awarded membership to the National Dean’s List. Mr. Wilkinson received his Juris Doctor degree from California Western School of Law School, where he received an honors award for authoring The EGTRRA Estate Tax Sunset Provision, Reform and Politics: A Fungible Alternative to Repeal, received the highest grade in both Contracts II and Arbitration Law, and graduated in the top one-third of his class.

David, a co-founder of Wilkinson & Finkbeiner, practices family law for the firm, handling all facets of the practice area, from straightforward negotiation and preparation of pleadings to complex litigation. As a highly experienced San Diego divorce attorney, Mr. Wilkinson has previously represented small and large asset clients in all types of family law matters.

While the Wilkinson & Finkbeiner, LLP philosophy adheres to a settlement-as-a-first-option, litigation-as-a-final-option mentality, several recent cases handled by Mr. Wilkinson evidence the broad range of his competence in both regards. In one recent case, David successfully negotiated to allow his client to move with the parties’ young child out of the state of California and to another state. “Move-away” cases are inherently complicated, but as a skilled child custody attorney in San Diego, David set his client up for success by preparing a strong case from the outset. In another case, David represented a mother as a San Diego guardianship lawyer who was fighting a guardianship action, which if granted by the Court, would have effectively taken the child out of the mother’s care. The proceeding had been dragging on for nearly one year. Within one month, Mr. Wilkinson prepared for and won at trial. The child was returned to the custody of the mother immediately.

In several other recent notable cases, David won another “move-away” matter which lasted almost two days in trial, successfully won his client a $20,000 attorney fee award as a sanction against the other party for his egregious conduct, successfully filed and received a judgment on a motion for child support arrears against a father who owed almost $300,000 to the children’s mother with accrued interest, successfully defended a domestic violence restraining order filed by the mother in a child custody matter which was intended to gain an advantage in the proceeding, obtained a default annulment (nullity) judgment for a client, and successfully negotiated an amendment to a Marital Settlement Agreement by filing a motion to set aside based on the failure to provide disclosures.

David has also litigated and negotiated division of marital property cases involving millions of dollars in assets. Mr. Wilkinson has extensive experience in dealing with Evidence Code 730 experts that are involved in high-asset cases, including forensic accountants, income evaluators, and business valuation experts as a division of marital property lawyer in San Diego. With more than 20 years of experience in family law litigation, Mr. Wilkinson has tried and successfully argued countless family law matters with high-value property valuation and property issues, dealing with multimillion dollar real estate, dividing stock, stock options, and restricted stock units, and dealing with extremely high-income levels as it relates to spousal support.*

David is currently a member of the Massachusetts Bar and runs the firm’s offices there.

For many years, David served as a “Judge Pro Tem” in San Diego, and was a supervising attorney for the California Western School of Law and University of California San Diego joint collaborative legal-medical Community Law Project, where he received the Judge Judy Keep Award from UCSD.

Finally, David earned his certificate from the California State Bar as a Family Law Specialist. This means that he is an expert in Family Law matters and is one of approximately 300 family law specialists throughout San Diego and Orange Counties.  He is also a Fellow in the AAML (MA Chapter) and Certified by the National Board of Trial Advocacy.

*Mr. Wilkinson’s successes in these cases creates no guarantee of success in any other case.

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