Bishop Eddie Long | About the attorneys

By Staff reports

For the AJC

Attorney B.J. Bernstein, representing the three plaintiffs suing Bishop Eddie Long, is perhaps best-known for her successful effort to free Genarlow Wilson in 2007. Wilson, a Douglas County teenager, was sentenced to 10 years in prison for having consensual sex with a minor girl; he was 17, she was 15. The state Supreme Court ruled that Wilson's sentence constituted cruel and unusual punishment, and he was freed after two years in prison. Bernstein (B.J. stands for Brenda Joy)  graduated from Emory University in 1984 and from the University of Georgia Law School  in 1987. She worked as a prosecutor in Gwinnett County for nearly seven years before going into private practice.

Craig Gillen, who is representing Bishop Eddie Long, first worked as a federal prosecutor in Atlanta, where he prosecuted the infamous pornographer Mike Thevis and sent U.S. Rep. Pat Swindall to prison. Gillen later became deputy independent counsel in the Iran-Contra investigation, in which he obtained an indictment of former Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger. More recently, he has represented high-profile criminal defendants, including Michael "Mikey Scars" DiLeonardo, who was acquitted in the Gold Club trial in 2001. Gillen graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1974 and from Emory Law School in 1976. He entered private practice in Atlanta in 1993.