If you or someone you know is seeking a private, confidential, cost-effective process for divorce or separation, bring your family law matters to resolution with the out-of-court mediation and collaborative divorce services of CT Mediation Center, led by Attorney Laurie G. DeNigris. Attorney DeNigris brings four decades of Connecticut family law experience to the table, including more than thirty years as an active mediator and collaborative practitioner. A founding leader of Connecticut’s collaborative divorce movement and a court-appointed Special Master for matrimonial matters, she has devoted her career to one conviction: that families do better when they resolve their differences with respect, at their own table, rather than in a courtroom.
Family Dispute Resolution Services
Comprehensive Divorce Mediation
Our full-process divorce mediation in Connecticut offers a private, respectful alternative to traditional litigation. In this approach, couples work directly with Attorney DeNigris over a series of sessions to address every aspect of the divorce — from property and asset division to child custody and parenting time, alimony, and child support. While attorneys are not present during the mediation sessions themselves, we encourage each of you to consult with independent “mediation review counsel” so that you receive individual legal advice on your decisions before anything is finalized.
Collaborative Divorce
For couples who want the support of their own attorney in the room without the threat of court hanging over the conversation, Attorney DeNigris offers collaborative divorce in Connecticut — a process she helped pioneer in Connecticut as a founding member and chair of the Central Connecticut Collaborative Family Law Group and a founding member of the Collaborative Divorce Lawyers Association. In a collaborative case, both spouses and their specially trained attorneys commit in writing to resolving every issue outside of court, through respectful, interest-based negotiation. Neutral specialists — financial professionals, child specialists, divorce coaches — can be brought in as needed, so that every decision is an informed one.
Settlement Conferences for Active Divorce Litigation
For parties already engaged in divorce litigation, Attorney DeNigris offers intensive settlement mediation. This process typically takes place in a focused session with both parties attending alongside their litigation attorneys, who remain at your side throughout. It is work she knows from the inside. During her long career, Attorney DeNigris was appointed as a Special Master for matrimonial matters in the Hartford, New Britain, and Middletown judicial districts and on the Regional Custody Trial Docket, where she helped litigating couples find settlement before trial. She brings that same impasse-breaking skill to private sessions — whether the goal is to resolve one contested issue or the entire case.
Parenting Plans and Custody Dispute Resolution
Some of the hardest questions families face are not financial. Attorney DeNigris works with parents on custody disputes, parenting plan design and adjustment, co-parenting communication, relocation questions, and the particular complexities of blended families. Her decades of custody work — including her past service on the Regional Custody Trial Docket — inform an approach that keeps children’s well-being at the center of every conversation.
Prenuptial and Postnuptial Agreement Mediation
Attorney DeNigris also mediates prenuptial and postnuptial agreements, helping couples have honest, constructive conversations about their financial future — before conflict ever has a chance to arise.
Why Choose a Veteran Family Law Attorney as Your Mediator?
Forty years inside Connecticut family law brings qualifications to the mediation table that few mediators can offer:
- Deep Legal Knowledge: Practicing family law in Connecticut since 1984, Attorney DeNigris knows how the courts weigh evidence and apply legal standards to divorce, custody, support, and property matters and assist people to prioritize their goals and interests as opposed to limiting themselves to what courts would do.
- Predictive Insight: As a court-appointed Special Master, she regularly evaluates contested cases the way a judge would — which allows her to give both of you a realistic assessment of likely outcomes, so your decisions in mediation are grounded ones.
- A True Believer in Staying Out of Court: Unlike the majority of divorce lawyers in the State of Connecticut, Attorney DeNigris did not add mediation to a litigation practice — she helped build Connecticut’s non-adversarial divorce community, founding and chairing collaborative practice groups and serving on the Best Practices Committee of the Connecticut Council for Non-Adversarial Divorce.
- Balanced Approach: Three decades of neutral work — as mediator and Special Master — have cultivated a genuine ability to see all sides of an issue and guide parties toward equitable, durable solutions.
- Procedural Expertise: A thorough command of Connecticut court procedure ensures that the agreement you reach will satisfy every requirement for court approval.
- Recognized by Her Peers: She has been selected to the Connecticut Super Lawyers list for family law and is a James W. Cooper Fellow of the Connecticut Bar Foundation.
Flexible Mediation Formats
All of our mediation and dispute resolution services are available:
- In Person: Face-to-face sessions in a professional, comfortable, neutral setting.
- Virtually: Secure video conferencing for convenient remote participation.
We are glad to help you choose the format that best fits your circumstances, your comfort, and your schedule. The large majority of our families we work with choose a hybrid model. Some sessions virtually and some in person.
Why Choose Private Mediation for Family Matters?
- Confidentiality: Sensitive family matters stay private and protected.
- Child-Centered Solutions: Arrangements are built around your children’s well-being, not around a court calendar.
- Cost-Effective: Avoid the financial and emotional expense of prolonged family litigation.
- Time Efficient: Resolve matters in weeks or months rather than the years court proceedings can take.
- Control: You and your spouse retain decision-making power over the outcomes that shape your family’s future.
- Expertise: You have the benefit of forty years of family law wisdom, without the courthouse.
The CT Mediation Center Advantage
With Attorney DeNigris as your mediator, you gain a neutral third party who understands both the legal framework and the human weight of what you are going through. Her approach pairs decades of legal insight with respectful, goal-oriented, interest-based negotiation — creating an environment in which families can find solutions that genuinely work for everyone at the table. She has spent her career watching what these methods make possible for families, compared to what litigation costs them — and it is why she has championed the non-adversarial path in Connecticut for more than thirty years.
Family Law Mediation Areas
- Dissolution of marriage
- Legal separation
- Post-judgment matters
- Child custody and parenting time arrangements
- Child support determination
- Alimony and spousal support
- Property and asset division
- Retirement account allocation
- Family business interests
- Post-divorce modifications
- Parenting plan adjustments
- Relocation issues
- Prenuptial and postnuptial agreements
- Blended family and stepparent matters
- High-conflict co-parenting disputes
Our Process
For Comprehensive Divorce Mediation
- Initial Discussion: We review your family’s situation and walk you through how the multi-session mediation process works.
- The Pleadings: court filings necessary to start the legal process, ensuring the Automatic Orders are in effect. No state marshal for service of process ever used, and the official process is initiate in the Court System.
- Information Gathering and Financial Inventory: Financial disclosures and relevant family documentation are collected.
- Series of Sessions: Focused meetings systematically address each issue in turn, at a pace that works for you.
- Outside Consultation: Time between sessions for each of you to consult with your own mediation review counsel.
- Negotiating and Drafting the Agreement: Development of a comprehensive family settlement agreement.
- Finalization: Drafting and updating final decisions, updating any information that may be relevant, signing the final documents and completing the process without Court attendance.
For Collaborative Divorce
- Participation Agreement: Both spouses and their collaboratively trained attorneys sign a binding commitment to resolve everything outside of court.
- Team Assembly: Where helpful, neutral financial professionals, child specialists, or coaches join the team.
- Joint Sessions: A series of structured four-way (or full-team) meetings works through each issue using interest-based negotiation.
- Transparent Disclosure: Both parties commit to full, voluntary exchange of all relevant information.
- Agreement and Filing: A comprehensive settlement agreement is drafted and submitted to the court for approval — typically without either spouse ever appearing for a contested hearing.
Ready to Learn More?
Contact CT Mediation Center today to talk about whether mediation or collaborative divorce with Attorney DeNigris is the right path for your family. We will answer your questions honestly, explain your options plainly, and help you decide what comes next.
About Attorney Laurie G. DeNigris
About Attorney Laurie G. DeNigrisAttorney Laurie G. DeNigris has practiced family law in Connecticut for four decades. She earned her B.A. in English from Skidmore College and her J.D. from Ohio Northern University’s Pettit College of Law, and was admitted to the Connecticut bar in 1984 and to the U.S. District Court for the District of Connecticut in 1985. Her practice encompasses all areas of family law, including divorce, legal separation, child custody, prenuptial agreements, and litigation support.
For more than thirty years, the heart of her work has been keeping families out of court. She is a founding member and chair of the Central Connecticut Collaborative Family Law Group and a founding member of the Collaborative Divorce Lawyers Association — organizations that helped establish collaborative divorce practice in Connecticut. She serves on the Best Practices Committee of the Connecticut Council for Non-Adversarial Divorce and is a member of the International Academy of Collaborative Professionals.
The Connecticut courts have repeatedly entrusted her with the role of Special Master for matrimonial matters, appointing her to assist settling cases in the Hartford, New Britain, and Middletown judicial districts and on the Regional Custody Trial Docket — a role in which she helps litigating couples find resolution before trial, at the request of the court itself.
Attorney DeNigris has been selected to the Connecticut Super Lawyers list for family law and is a James W. Cooper Fellow of the Connecticut Bar Foundation. She is a member of the Connecticut Counsel for Non-Adversarial Divorce as well as other bar-related organizations and groups. A believer in making the law understandable to the people it affects, she has taught at The People’s Law School and presented at National Business Institute and Connecticut Bar Association seminars.
Her long experience on every side of family disputes — as counsel, as a collaborative attorney, as a mediator, and as a neutral appointed by the courts — allows her to help families make difficult decisions with dignity, clarity, and respect, and most importantly, in accordance with their goals and interests.