Duran Keller and Erin Witte Recognized With ‘Rising Star’ Awards
WASHINGTON — Nationally renowned consumer lawyer Leonard A. Bennett has received the National Consumer Law Center’s 2025 Vern Countryman Award. The prestigious annual honor recognizes an attorney whose special contributions to consumer law have strengthened and affirmed the rights of low-income and other vulnerable consumers.
“Len Bennett has left an indelible mark on the field of consumer law, inside and outside the courtroom,” said Richard Dubois, executive director of the National Consumer Law Center. “His groundbreaking litigation has advanced credit and consumer reporting law across the country. And his generous mentorship and financial support has nurtured a generation of young lawyers, creating a legacy that will strengthen the consumer law community far into the future.”
Founding Partner of the Virginia law firm Consumer Litigation Associates, Bennett has been a fierce consumer advocate for decades, winning multimillion-dollar judgments against payday loan businesses, debt collectors, credit reporting agencies, and scam lenders. He also devotes considerable time and resources to training a new generation of consumer advocates.
Bennett has been a trial attorney and consumer advocate since 1994 in Newport News, Va. He serves on the Board of Directors of the National Association of Consumer Advocates (NACA), on the National Consumer Law Center’s Partner’s Council, as a Williamsburg Society member of the Virginia Trial Lawyers Association, and as a member of the Trial Law Institute and Diversity Law Institute.
He has directed sizable cy pres awards from his successful class action lawsuits to support legal aid and public interest organizations working for consumer justice, including the Virginia Poverty Law Center, Public Justice, Legal Aid Justice Center, and NCLC. He co-founded Hampton Roads Refugee Relief and has sustained numerous organizations supporting low-income Virginians.
NCLC presented the award at its 33nd annual Consumer Rights Litigation Conference in Washington, D.C. It also presented Rising Star Awards to Duran Keller and Erin Witte. The Rising Star Awards are awarded annually by the NCLC Partners Council to one or more attorneys in practice for 15 years or fewer who have made major contributions to consumer law within the past two years by trying or settling a case of great success and significance.
Duran Keller founded the firm Keller Law in his hometown of Lafayette, Indiana, where his consumer law practice focuses on credit reporting and repossessions.
Erin Witte is the director of Consumer Protection for the Consumer Federation of America (CFA). Erin leads CFA’s advocacy efforts in consumer protection, including advocating for consumer protections in Congress and at regulatory agencies.
The Consumer Rights Litigation Conference is the largest and most comprehensive educational conference for consumer attorneys in the nation.
The Vern Countryman Award is presented each year to a legal services or other public interest attorney whose special contributions to the practice of consumer law have strengthened and affirmed the rights of low-income Americans. Since the first award was presented in 1990, it has become the preeminent honor for consumer attorneys.
The Rising Star Award is presented annually by the National Consumer Law Center’s Partners Council to one or more attorneys in practice for 15 years or less who have made major contributions to consumer law within the past two years by trying or settling a case of great success and significance.
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