SPECTOR FOERST & ASSOCIATES - Key Persons

David Spector began his legal career in the 1960s in Brooklyn, New York, fighting for the rights of immigrants and protecting the injured from overbearing insurance companies. He was joined in 1999 by James M. Foerst, Esq., of Westfield, New Jersey. Jim expanded the practice areas of the law firm, incorporating real estate, estate planning, criminal defense matters and a variety of additional general civil practice niches.

Jim grew up in the western part of New Jersey, on the outskirts of Belvidere, where his father maintained a law practice until 2011. A 1996 graduate of Seton Hall University, Jim concentrated his undergraduate studies in government and law. He received his law degree with honors from Seton Hall University School of Law in 1999, and joined the Law Offices of David Spector where he initially concentrated in plaintiffs' personal injury cases. After the law offices moved to Millburn in 2000, the practice expanded into other areas of law, including transactional matters. Following David Spector's retirement in 2009, the firm evolved into Spector Foerst & Associates, with Jim as its managing partner. Jim currently serves as prosecutor for the Borough of Mountainside, and is an adjunct professor focusing on zoning, planning and land use policy at Seton Hall Law School. He has been named a New Jersey Super Lawyer every year since 2011, and is certified by the New Jersey Supreme Court as a Civil Trial Attorney, a designation earned by less than 1 percent of attorneys in the state. Jim lives in Westfield, where he serves on the Recreation Commission; he is also a Member of the Board of Directors of New Jersey Camp Jaycee, an ARC-affiliated summer camp. He and wife Cara, who met at Seton Hall Law (where she is currently Dean of Academic Affairs), are parents of two boys. Also a runner, Jim ran the New York Marathon in 2014.

Michael graduated from Seton Hall University with a Bachelor of Science Degree in finance, Magna Cum Laude, and earned his Juris Doctorate degree from Seton Hall School of Law. A skilled litigator and defense attorney who knows his way around a courtroom, he specializes in all aspects of litigation, civil and criminal. With 15 years of legal experience, Michael complements the personal injury and general litigation section of our practice, focusing on automobile accidents, slip and falls, wrongful deaths, workers compensation, insurance fraud, and criminal defense. A fighter for his clients, he likes nothing more than to spar successfully against defense counsel in a personal injury case and help his injured clients go from fear and despair to the sheer relief of receiving just compensation for their losses. Just out of law school in 2005, Michael clerked for Judge Peter F. Bariso, Hudson County Civil Division for a year, and then joined Chasan, Leyner & Lamparello, P.C., in Secaucus. There, he helped represent large insurance carriers as well as managing insurance defense cases involving auto accidents and personal injury, premises liability, and denial of insurance coverage. In 2010 Michael joined Aromando, Light & Croft, LLC, in West Caldwell, where he led the firm's insurance coverage and litigation practice, representing plaintiffs, while also covering environmental torts, personal injury, legal malpractice and commercial insurance coverage. Two years later, Michael opened his own law office in Roseland. He litigated personal injury protection (PIP) arbitration and health care matters on behalf of clients against insurance companies, and managed cases involving personal injury, criminal defense, small business collections, commercial insurance, and insurance fraud, settling more than $2 million for his clients. Michael joined Spector Foerst & Associates in 2020. Originally from Essex County, Michael grew up in Roseland and now lives in Boonton Township. He and wife Elissa own and operate two yoga studios in Montville and Wayne and three plant-based cafés in Montville, Wayne and Hackensack. In his free time he enjoys sports, and plays in intramural softball and volleyball leagues. Michael Cuellar joined the firm in 2020 and greatly expanded the personal injury practice of the law firm. Having worked in insurance defense, PIP Arbitration and injury work, his skill set coupled with the firms of history of injury representation make us a premier law firm in New Jersey in the injury market.