Luke Z. Fenchel

Luke Z. Fenchel serves a diverse clientele of professionals, families of college students, and other Ithacans, using experience, knowledge, education, creativity, and technology to provide them with the most effective and efficient legal defense. In the last five years, Fenchel was the lead attorney on hundreds of criminal cases. During Fenchel’s tenure at Holmberg Galbraith, he was partner and headed firm’s criminal defense practice into the greater Finger Lakes region, and throughout the State of New York, especially upstate. He has built respected and respectful relationships with the prosecutors, judges, court clerks, probation officers, and law-enforcement officials who form the legal landscape in upstate New York. He has defended friends and family members of judges, clerks, sheriff deputies, probation and police officers, as well as other governmental employees. A familiar face in Ithaca City and Ithaca Town Court, Fenchel also regularly appears in the town courts of Dryden and Lansing, as well as those of Caroline, Danby, Enfield, Groton, Newfield, and Ulysses, and the Village Courts of Cayuga Heights and Freeville. Fenchel has successfully defended misdemeanor and felony matters in the neighboring counties of Cortland, Chemung, Seneca, Cayuga, Schuyler, and Tioga Counties. And his practice includes violations of conditional discharge and probation, as well as litigation involving the removal of ignition interlock devices. He regularly represents college and university students charged with on-campus violations at Ithaca College, where he has been an adjunct lecturer in Legal Studies since 2011, as well as at Cornell University, Tompkins Cortland Community College, and other schools in the region. He has served as an on-campus counselor and advocate in cases in which charges were dismissed at the Ithaca College Conduct Review Board, has worked on cases before the University Hearing Board at Cornell University, as well as successfully negotiated medical and non-disciplinary withdrawals from both campuses. Fenchel has also represented accused persons charged with Title IX violations.