Although officially formed in July 2004, BRE Law is the culmination of the merger and expansion of one of the oldest law firms in Central Illinois. In 1971, Jon D. Robinson joined the Decatur law firm of Hull, Campbell & Robinson. In 2004, Jon and T.G. Bolen, an attorney who had practiced law in Central Illinois since 1960, teamed with Christopher M. Ellis, a Decatur native who recently returned home after practicing law at large law firms in Washington D.C. and Chicago, to form BRE Law.

Quick growth ensued, resulting in BRE Law hiring Mt. Zion native Shane Mendenhall following his graduation from law school in Oklahoma. Shane remained with the firm until he was elected to serve as Resident Circuit Judge for Macon County in 2022. Drew Hickey and Matthew Spain joined BRE Law a few years later. In 2015, Josh Rohrscheib joined the firm.

2017 brought a period of continued growth. First, former prosecutor Nrupa Patel joined BRE Law, allowing the firm to begin offering criminal defense services. Finally, BRE Law and the Sullivan law firm of Wood & Mayberry merged, which led to the addition of a Sullivan office and legendary Moultrie County attorney Steve Wood.

In 2018, Zach Anderson, who had worked at BRE Law for four years as a law clerk, became a lawyer following his graduation from the University of Illinois College of Law. That same year, BRE Law opened a third office in Bloomington, Illinois. In 2019, Andrew Wessler was added to our Decatur team. In 2020, we opened a fourth office in Lincoln, Illinois and added a new lawyer: Courtney Anderson.

In 2021, Dan L. Flannell joined our Sullivan office, after a lengthy and distinguished career serving as Moultrie County’s Resident Circuit Judge as well as Chief Judge of the six counties comprising the 6th Judicial Circuit of Illinois. Following his retirement from the bench in 2017, Dan served as the Administrator of the City of Sullivan.