Helen is a Florida Bar Board-certified appellate specialist, admitted to practice in Florida and Federal courts. She has over 100 appellate opinions in a 27-year career, covering civil, administrative and criminal law appeals, as well as doing trial support for the majority of cases tried by her law firm. After serving as law clerk to the presiding judge of the Third District Court of Appeals from 1982-84, Helen opened her own appellate practice, subsequently co-creating the firm Dittmar & Hauser, P.A., which merged into Restani, Dittmar, & Hauser, P.A. Helen has practiced in all five Florida appellate circuits, as well as the Florida Supreme Court, U.S. Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals, and the U.S. Supreme Court.
She concentrates in the areas of medical malpractice defense, insurance coverage, insurance insolvency, product liability, civil rights, governmental liability, and other tort defense. A writer and lecturer on comparative fault issues, Helen has served on the Steering Committee for the Florida Bar publication Comparative Negligence and Contribution in Florida, 5th, 6th, 7th, and 8th editions.
Helen, a native of Miami, graduated from Duke University as an Angier B. Duke Scholar with honors in English, earned a Ph.D. from the University of Florida in English, and taught at the university level for six years before earning her J.D. as a Reid Scholar from the University of Miami. A former president of the South Miami-Kendall Bar Association, she is also active in the local nonprofit community as an arts advocate, musician, and volunteer executive of Alhambra Orchestra.
Published Opinions
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