User:Ebetsyparks/Edith Lutnick, Esq.

EDITH LUTNICK, ESQ

Edith (Edie) Lutnick is a Co-founder, Officer, and the Executive Director of The Cantor Fitzgerald Relief Fund, a 501(c)3 not for profit charity established September 14, 2001, to address the short and long term needs of victims of terrorism, natural disasters and emergencies. Under Ms. Lutnick's leadership, The Cantor Fitzgerald Relief Fund has raised and distributed over $180 million dollars to over 800 families of the victims of the 9/11 terrorist attacks and has been instrumental in assisting them to heal.

More recently, she has been instrumental in providing financial donations to wounded members of the U.S. Armed Services and their families who served in the U.S. and NATO troops in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.

Post 9/11 Ms. Lutnick has emerged as a strong advocate and family leader not only on behalf of The Cantor Fitzgerald Relief Fund families, but of all 9/11 victims' families, representing their positions on issues of import. Ms. Lutnick is a respected voice on a multitude of 9/11 advisory groups including the September 11th National Memorial and Museum and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.

Prior to September 11, 2001 and beginning in 1983, Ms. Lutnick practiced Labor Law. In 1991 she started her own practice, to which she added a partner, forming Lutnick & Swomley in 1998. Ms. Lutnick turned her practice over to her partners in the wake of 9/11 in order to devote her energies full time to the 9/11 community.

Ms. Lutnick holds a BS from the University of Rhode Island (1980) and a JD and MBA (1982) from Syracuse University.

In addition to sitting on the Board of Directors of The Cantor Fitzgerald Relief Fund, Ms. Lutnick also sits on the Board of Directors of My Good Deed, and is an Honorary Board Member of A Caring Hand, The Billy Esposito Foundation.

The bond between Edie Lutnick and her brothers Howard and Gary was cemented long before September 11th.

The Lutnick family grew up in Jericho, Long Island, the children of a history professor and an artist. But both parents died within a year and a half of each other in the late 1970’s. Edie Lutnick said no other family members were there to help.

"We were really very much left on our own,” says Lutnick. “Nobody kind of swooped in and said, ‘I'll take care of you, I'll save the day.’ The three of us had to fend for ourselves."

She went off to Syracuse to earn a law degree and an MBA. Gary was in high school at the time and came to live with her.

"Gary was my brother and in a lot of respects he was my child,” says Lutnick. "In the earlier years it is fair to say that I took care of them and as time went on and they found their legs, they took care of me."

Edie Lutnick says she wanted to protect her younger brother, but that ability was taken from her on September 11th when he was killed 9/11 in 1 WTC, 104 Floor, eSpeed/Cantor Fitzgerald.

As Ms. Lutnick most recently discuss the milestone ten year anniversary, she stated, “I think it is important for use to hear the stories not yet told, many of which show the depth of humanity and individual strength that was borne of that historic event. From the couple who drove across the country collecting teddy bears for 9/11 children, to the many volunteers who worked long hours. Only through these untold stories can we understand the full breadth of what happened on that devastating day”.

Edie Lutnick is the author of “An Unbroken Bond, the Untold Story of How the 658 Cantor Fitzgerald Families Face the Tragedy of 9/11 and Beyond”.