Bio:

 

Svend was born and raised in Charlotte, North Carolina, the fifth of five sons.  He was the 6th Eagle Scout in the family (including his father).  He attended public elementary, junior high and high school in Charlotte.  After being graduated from West Charlotte High School, Svend attended St. Andrews Presbyterian College (now University) for two years before transferring to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill where he received a bachelor’s degree in International Studies.

 

An avid rugby player in college, Svend spent a few post college years working in restaurants and traveling around playing the occasional rugby game in places like Australia, New Zealand, England and the Cayman Islands.  In 1996 he turned his restaurant experience into a full time (and then some) job, opening Sir Edmond Halley’s Restaurant and Freehouse (www.halleyspub.com).  In 2002 he sold his interest in the restaurant to a business partner.  He continued to work full time at “Sir Ed’s” until he entered law school at the University of North Carolina School of Law in the fall of 2004.

 

A reluctant rote learner, in law school Svend focused his efforts on gaining practical experience.  In the winter of 2004 he spent his winter break shadowing various assistant district attorneys in the Mecklenburg County courts, where he was introduced to the basics of criminal law.  In the summer of 2005, Svend was a law clerk at the Charlotte firm of James, McElroy and Diehl, where he observed depositions, mediations, and assisted in the preparation of discovery and court filings.  In the summer of 2006, Svend availed himself of the opportunity to work as a summer clerk for the national law firm of Cozen O’Connor, in their Charlotte office.  As a Cozen summer clerk, Svend participated in all aspects of civil litigation- from filing complaints to drafting final orders, and everything in between.  In the fall of 2006 Svend was selected as an extern to the Hon. Judge John Jolly of the North Carolina Business Court.  While working for Judge Jolly, Svend was able to experience first hand the process that judges go through in assessing the merits of the matters before them, researching the pertinent issues, and of paramount importance, the way in which a judge renders his or her opinion on those matters.

 

Upon completion of law school in 2007, Svend studied for and passed the North Carolina bar.  He then began work for Cozen O’Connor full time as an associate attorney.  At Cozen, Svend focused his practice on construction defect and product defect litigation. Because Cozen is a large full-service litigation firm, Svend was also able to gain extensive experience in contract disputes, complex business litigation, and administrative law.  Svend was made a Member of the firm in 2015.

 

In 2017, Svend left Cozen O’Connor after an eleven-year association to start his own firm- the Deal Law Firm, PLLC.

In addition to North Carolina state courts, Svend is licensed to practice law in South Carolina state courts (2010), the US Federal District Court for North Carolina, Western District (2008); Middle District (2010); Eastern District (2012); the Federal District for South Carolina (2011); and the United States Supreme Court (2015).  In addition to those jurisdictions, Svend has litigated cases, pro hac vice, in state and federal courts in Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, West Virginia, Virginia, and Georgia.  Over his career, Svend was also privileged enough to have participated in matters involving litigation in China, Canada and Chile.