About Larissa
Larissa Waltman studied English and sociology at the University of Michigan, graduating with a B.A. in 1996. She went on to earn her J.D. from Wayne State University Law School in 1999. The combination of liberal arts and law school grounded her in close reading, written argument and the practice of law during a period of rapid change in legal services.
Early in her career she moved through a series of internships and clerkships that exposed her to different practice settings. In 1998 she interned at the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and worked as a law clerk for Klimist, McKnight, Sale, McClow & Canzono, P.C. By 2000 she was serving as a law clerk and later as a lawyer at Gregory, Moore, Jeakle, Heinen & Brooks, P.C., and she took a staff lawyer position at the UAW Legal Services Plan that same year. Those roles offered courtroom experience and steady client contact across a range of matters.
Waltman took on a managing role at Waltman Law PLLC in 2016. The move formalized work she had been doing for years and established an office base for her practice. Her title and the firm name reflect that transition to a central role in running a small practice while continuing day-to-day client work.
She is admitted to practice in Michigan and in the U.S. District Court for both the Eastern and Western Districts of Michigan. Professionally she has been active in bar and community groups. She has been a member of the Consumer Bankruptcy Association of Detroit since 2012 and of the Debtors Bar of West Michigan since 2016. She serves on the board of Community Mediation Services as a volunteer mediator, a role she began in 2020 and continues to hold. She also has been involved with the Rotary Club of Gaylord, joining the board in 2018 and serving as club president from 2019 to 2020.
Those affiliations mirror the practical work she does. Much of her caseload involves bankruptcy and debt-related matters, and she regularly appears in state and federal courts across Michigan. Her mediation work adds an alternative dispute resolution dimension to that practice and she often balances negotiated outcomes alongside contested filings.
Waltman continues to operate out of Waltman Law PLLC, taking court cases, mediation matters and client consultations in Michigan and the federal districts where she is admitted to practice. Her current practice centers on consumer bankruptcy, debtor representation and mediation work.
