Bonnie Reid Berkow was a founding member of Wagner, Berkow & Brandt LLP, and a long-time partner with Steve Wagner. With over thirty years’ experience litigating in State and Federal Courts in New York State, Ms. Berkow focuses her practice on complex commercial litigation, at both the trial and appellate level. Ms. Berkow has handled cases involving breach of contract, fraud and breach of fiduciary duty, in addition to real estate disputes and commercial actions. Ms. Berkow is experienced in all facets of landlord/tenant law and procedure. She also has extensive experience in appellate practice representing both appellants and respondents.

Representative clients include cooperative and condominium boards, residential unit owners, sponsors, and individuals or corporations involved in contract disputes. Ms. Berkow has successfully litigated cases involving construction defects in large residential cooperatives and condominiums, challenges to sponsor control and excessive ownership in cooperatives and condominiums, mediation of Martin Act claims before the New York State Office of the Attorney General, intra-shareholder disputes, noise complaints, constructive eviction and breach of warranty of habitability arising out of leaks or other damage to the apartment and Article 78 proceedings challenging Board actions. Ms. Berkow also deals with disputes surrounding corporate governance and election law, challenges to by-laws and other corporate documents, preliminary injunction and declaratory judgment actions, termination of commercial leases, condominium lien foreclosures, arbitration and mediation, discrimination, and negotiating access and license fees from developers for protection of adjoining property.

In Board of Managers of Parkchester N. Condominium v. Quiles, Ms. Berkow successfully challenged the applicability of the NYC Pet Law to condominiums in the First Department, obtaining a result contrary to the position of the Second Department. In her appeal in Tener v. Cremer, the Appellate Division, First Department, in a case of first impression, established guidelines for e-discovery from a non-party.

Ms. Berkow has been a guest panelist at the NYARM Real Estate Expo and a contributor to the New York Law Journal, Habitat Magazine and BrickUnderground.

Ms. Berkow’s calm, resolute demeanor, deep knowledge of the law, attention to detail and strong writing skills have contributed to her success in the field.

Ms. Berkow was born in Canada. After moving to New York, she became enamored with the law during her years as a legal secretary, during which she assisted defense counsel in the Rubin “Hurricane” Carter case.