For the past 14 years, Ned served as a trial judge on the Hennepin County District Court.  He spent most of his time on civil litigation and civil trials, with significant assignments in family and criminal court. As a trial judge, he presided over dozens of jury and bench trials on civil cases of every description, including some very substantial cases that commanded significant attention in the legal community.

Before he became a judge, Ned was a partner at Faegre & Benson LLC (now Faegre Drinker) and at Oppenheimer, Wolff & Donnelly (now Fox Rothschild), and practiced in the Washington, D.C. office of Morrison & Foerster. In his civil practice, he handled business and financial litigation for significant national and regional clients around the country.

Before entering practice, Ned clerked for the Hon. Gerald W. Heaney on the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit and served as a staff attorney for the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals.

Ned earned his law degree at the University of Chicago (1983) and earned a Master of Arts degree in English at the University of Virginia (1980).  He earned his B.A. at Northwestern University in 1978.

Ned is active around the country in teaching judges and lawyers. He has taught at the National Judicial College since 2015 (civil litigation, evidence, legal writing, election law) and at Minnesota CLE since 1989.  He edits the Minnesota CLE Evidence Deskbook and chairs the Civil Jury Instructions Guide Committee for the Minnesota District Judges Association.

Ned’s peers have honored him for his contributions to the judiciary and to the law. In 2025, the Minnesota Chapter of the American Board of Trial Advocates named Ned co-honoree as Trial Judge of the Year (with the Hon. Laurie Miller (retired), also of Lighthouse). The Minnesota State Bar Association Civil Section awarded Ned with its Advocate Award in 2024. And the Minnesota District Judges Association honored Ned with its President’s Award (2023) and the Tammi A. Fredrickson Judicial Service Award (2022).