Marci is a native of the Harrison/Marion County area. She distinguished herself at West Virginia University during her undergraduate and legal studies. Marci was recognized as both a WVU National Merit Scholar and a West Virginia University Presidential Scholar. She graduated summa cum laude as well as first in her class with a B.A. in the Department of Political Science from West Virginia University. A WVU Honors Scholar, Marci received the Dennis O'Brien Outstanding Senior Award within the university-wide honors program and was recognized as Outstanding Senior in the Department of Political Science. While attending school full-time and working at a variety of jobs, Marci earned membership in Phi Beta Kappa and was active as a member and officer in a number of undergraduate organizations and service projects. A 1997 graduate of the West Virginia University College of Law, Marci was awarded the Steptoe & Johnson and Henry S. Cato Scholarships and the George S. Tucker Brooke Fellowship. During her law school tenure, she served as Research Editor for the West Virginia Law Review and as a teaching assistant in Legal Research and Writing. Marci was involved in the M.E. Lugar Trial Association and served two years as an officer of the Volunteer Law Clerks Association at the WVU College of Law.
Marci is admitted to practice before all West Virginia municipal, county, and state courts as well as the northern and southern federal district courts for West Virginia. She is also admitted to the bar of the United States Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims. Marci is an actively involved officer of the Marion County Bar Association and a member of the Family Law Committee of the West Virginia State Bar Association. She currently serves on the Marion County Deputy Sheriff's Civil Service Commission and formerly served on the Marion County Correctional Officers Civil Service Commission until it was dissolved shortly after the implementation of the regional jail system in West Virginia.
Marci has held a wide variety of jobs over the years including positions in more traditional office settings, as a legal advocate intern at a domestic violence shelter, and even unexpected jobs such as plain-clothes loss prevention for a national department store chain. As a law student, she worked for a local solo practitioner where she was largely responsible for the attorney's social security disability practice. Immediately upon graduation from law school, Marci accepted employment with a small litigation firm in southern West Virginia where she enjoyed the demands of their medical malpractice defense practice.
Electing to move back to her home town and to be closer to her family, Marci opened her own office in 1998 as a general practice where she has represented a number of clients in a wide range of civil law matters. She became increasingly involved in domestic relations/family law matters in the course of her solo practice. In 2003 Marci elected to concentrate solely in domestic relations/family law matters and began offering mediation services as an adjunct to her law practice after receiving specialized training in general civil and domestic relations mediation. Family courts on occasion appoint Marci as a guardian ad litem/custody evaluator in specific cases where paternity is at issue or there is a serious custody/visitation/parenting plan dispute; in those cases, she is responsible for conducting an independent investigation and filing her findings and recommendations with the court. Marci finds her family law practice to be rewarding in that it allows her to help people both now and in the long term in some of the most basic and intimate aspects of their lives and to help children both directly and indirectly.
When not engaged in the practice of law, Marci oversees the administrative aspects of her family's small retail business and enjoys spending time with her family, their German shepherds, beagle and Siberian husky (who she regards as her "furry-faced children"), reading, doing yard work, and camping.
