Bullard Law welcomes Heather Van Meter to the firm. A Pacific Northwest native, Ms. Van Meter grew up working at her family’s natural resources and retail businesses, as a receptionist and sales clerk then bookkeeper. After earning her M.B.A. and J.D. degrees at Willamette University, Ms. Van Meter spent 22 years in major law firms, teaching, and serving the Oregon Department of Justice. She brings her decades of education and legal experience, an inquisitive mind, and friendly nature to serve our clients.

Ms. Van Meter began her legal career as a big firm associate, becoming a partner at Williams Kastner. She then took advantage of an opportunity to teach in Vietnam, teaching commercial law and company law at RMIT-Saigon. Returning from Vietnam, Ms. Van Meter taught constitutional law and evidence at Lewis & Clark Law School, and then spent nearly nine years in the Oregon Department of Justice’s Civil Litigation Section, defending the state and its employees in employment, contracts, torts, civil rights, administrative law, and other legal disputes. As a trusted lawyer and trial attorney with over 20 years’ experience and dozens of trials and appeals, she has the knowledge to handle all her clients’ needs and a lifetime of wisdom to give practical advice to her clients.

While working as a trial attorney, Ms. Van Meter obtained a Master’s degree in human rights law at the University of Oxford, and a Ph.D. in international law at the University of Birmingham (England). She continues teaching to this day, leading graduate school classes in ethics, sustainability, and social responsibility at Willamette University’s Atkinson Graduate School of Management. As a professor, Ms. Van Meter has gained the ability to explain complex legal matters in understandable ways.