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Arturo Alvarez, Founding Member Of Cuban American Bar Association, Dies At 71

COURTESY OF CESAR ALVAREZ
Arturo Alvarez posing at his daughter Danielle Alvarez’s wedding on Jan. 10, 2015. Alvarez died on Monday Dec. 9, 2019.";

Arturo Alvarez, trailblazing Miami trial lawyer and co-founder of the Cuban American Bar Association, died Monday at the age of 71.

A native of Havana, Cuba, Alvarez was one of a handful of Cuban law students at the University of Florida when he graduated in 1972. He entered his field at a time when South Florida firms were in dire need of bilingual attorneys, but they still lacked a community to rely on.

“In one of the courtrooms [at the time], a judge told a lawyer of Cuban descent that spoke with an accent to get out of the courtroom... ‘You can come back when you can speak English,’” recalled his brother Cesar Alvarez, an attorney for Greenberg Traurig.

Read more at our news partner the Miami Herald.

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