John Ahlgren provides a broad range of legal services to businesses, individuals and non-profits. In four decades representing a variety of clients, he developed a keen ability to quickly evaluate a client’s need and recommend an efficient, affordable course of legal action. John’s legal practice focuses on business, personal injury, asset protection, real estate, elder law, divorce and custody matters. He provides sensitive, creative estate planning advice to individuals and the elderly, and counsels the best course of action for older persons working with Medicaid and social service issues. Over the course of his career, John represented people wrongly injured and helped them receive maximum compensation for their personal and economic injuries. In 1982, he successfully negotiated the pardon of an incarcerated woman convicted of murdering her abusive husband, the state of New Hampshire’s first pardon for murder in 100 years. In 1994, he helped prosecute Krempels v. Maine Turnpike Authority, et al, a Federal trial which resulted in the largest plaintiff’s verdict ever–$10 million–in the state of Maine.
Prior to joining HPG&R in 2015, John was the senior partner at Ahlgren, Perrault and Pudloski, P.A., the Portsmouth firm he founded in 1978. He began his legal career in 1973 at the N.H. Attorney General’s office, providing a broad array of administrative counsel, then serving as an assistant attorney general representing the state of New Hampshire before and state and federal courts as well as administrative bodies. Agencies represented included the Department of Labor, Motor Vehicles, Public Utilities Commission, Horse and Dog Racing Commissions, Industrial Development Authority and all environmental agencies of the State as well as they Boards of Registration for Engineers, Architects and Surveyors. While in the attorney general’s office, John wrote the brief used by Attorney General David Souter to successfully defeat the U.S. Coast Guard’s attempt to assert federal jurisdiction over Lake Winnipesaukee.
Admissions
- New Hampshire
- Maine
- U.S. District and Circuit Courts serving New Hampshire, Maine and northern California
Education
- Saint Paul’s School
- University of Pennsylvania, B.A.
- Hastings College of Law, J.D.
Memberships
- New Hampshire, Maine and California Bar Associations
Community Involvement
- Board Member, Parma Music Festival, Inc.
- Advisory Board, Krempels Center
- Advisory Board, RAIN for the Sahel and Sahara, Inc.
- Advisory Board, Portsmouth Symphony Orchestra
- Advisory Board, Pontine Movement Theatre
- Past member, Newmarket (NH) Town Council
- Past member and chair, Newmarket Planning Board
- Past member, Newmarket Community Development Corporation
- Past Board member, The Krempels Center
- Past Board member, Pontine Movement Theatre
- Past Board member, RAIN for the Sahel and Sahara, Inc.
- Past Board member, ABC Quilts, Inc.