The Finnish American Lawyers Association, FALA, hosted a cocktail party at the Hotel Marriot Marquis at 46th Street and Broadway in New York City, at the Atrium Bar, on Saturday evening on January 30, 2010. Honorable John Pessala (Executive Director of FALA) coordinated the meeting to take place at the same time as the New York State Bar Association meeting in NYC that weekend. Judge John Lahtinen, an Appellate Judge in the Third Department (upstate New York) was in NYC attending the event and was thus able to attend the FALA event as well, with his wife Eleanor. The other FALA members attending were as follows: Robert Alan Saasto, Esq. (President FALA) with his wife Mary Ellen; Tom Hakala, Esq, (Treasurer FALA) with his wife Marilynn Hakala, Esq.; Ernest Saasto, Esq. (Vice President FALA); Pasi Mantyla, Esq., (FALA web site, NY attorney); Benjamin Tuiskula, Esq. ( Sullivan & Cromwell, a leading NYC law firm); Jarno Vanto, Esq., (author of International Contracts); Juha Harsu, Esq. (retired bank attorney from Finland); Jussi Hoaas, Esq. with his wife Katarina (upstate New York); and Jan Johansson, Esq. (corporate and immigration attorney in NYC and Southampton). Two new members from the Permanent Mission of Finland to the United Nations attended their first FALA function. Arto Haapea, Esq., is a legal advisor to the UN and Anne-Maria Seesmaa is a junior advisor, serving as an intern to Arto. In addition to the FALA members, friends of FALA attending were the following: Arshad Majid, Esq., (criminal and family law practice in Hauppauge Long Island NY); Maria Albright (former secretary to Judge Pessala at Family Court in Westbury, LI, NY and presently a Federal Agent for US Postal Inspector) and her fiancé Joseph Croce (retired NYPD police detective). Robert Alan Saasto, Esq. President, FALA

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