I‘ll start with the traditional lawyer bio. I have been practicing law for over 20 years. I was Editor-in-Chief of the University of Kansas Law Review. Right after law school, I served as a clerk for a United States District Court Judge in Kansas City.
I moved with my wife-to-be to Washington, D.C. and practiced for several years at Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft doing patent litigation, international corporate investigations, and commercial finance. I left CWT and went to work for the United States Department of Justice doing tax and corporate fraud litigation. What surprised me and what I miss the most about DC was the Chesapeake Bay. After 10 years in DC, we moved back to Kansas City.
For the past 10+ years I have worked to help people, especially people who have been thrown off their path by someone else’s carelessness. It takes incredible courage to fight back when someone has hurt you or your family. I have learned so much about people (and myself) helping guide them through the court system after catastrophic injury. Injury to the brain takes away the person you once knew. Lasting injury to the back and spine can reduce you to a fraction of the person you once were.
I do this work because I powerfully empathize with people who find their lives wrecked financially and physically. I am passionate about helping because I understand having no safety net. I grew up in a small house outside of Topeka, Kansas. I was the first to go to college, and I’m still paying for my education. I didn’t know any lawyers or other professionals growing up.
I remember a moment when I was 19 years old. I was in college, had no money, and an uninsured driver ran into my beat-up car, totaling it. I remember sleeping on the floor of a friend’s house that night wondering what I was going to do. I was lost. It didn’t happen immediately, but over the course of the next few months, I found a relentless mentality of never giving up.
Prior Experience
United States Department of Justice
Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft
Clerk, The Honorable Carlos Murguia (United States District Court in Kansas City, Kansas)
Education
University of Kansas School of Law, 2003
Editor in Chief, Kansas Law Review
Samuel Mellinger Leadership, Scholarship, and Service Award
Order of the Coif (top 10%)
CALI Award (top grade) – Contracts, Water Law
University of Oregon, Masters of Science, Biology 1998
University of Kansas, Biochemistry & Philosophy, 1996
Bar Admission
Kansas, Missouri, US Patent and Trademark Office
Honors & Awards
Named “Best of Bar” in Kansas City by a vote of fellow attorneys
2014 Class of Centurions Leaders Program, Kansas City Chamber of
Commerce
