| Seminar Co-Chairs: Keith Marr, Great Falls Greg Pinski, Great Falls April 20, 2012
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Live Interactive OPTION - Problems with hours of driving time, hotel costs, time away from office? MTLA and Fisher Video Conferencing have a solution.Attend MTLA Seminars Via Live Interactive Video At Remote Locations in: Only available in Bozeman and Kalispell. During online registration use the COMMENTS box to enter the remote location site nearest to you. |
| Seminar Sponsor FISHER - Video Conferencing | Court Reporting | Video Services | Trial Presentation Consultation |
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| Speakers & Topics | ||
| 7:30 | Registration & Breakfast | |
| 8:25 | Introduction & Welcome – Jonathan McDonald, Helena | |
| 8:30 |
Voir Dire – New Pitches for Better Strikes (with a live demonstration) |
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| Monte Beck, Bozeman | ||
| 10:00 | BREAK | |
| 10:15 |
Selected Issues in Insurance and Bad Faith Litigation |
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| Gary Zadick, Great Falls | ||
| 11:15 |
Everything You Need to Know About a Consumer Law Case |
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| John Heenan, Billings | ||
| 12:15 | LUNCH (on your own) | |
| 1:45 | Mediation — Panel Discussion | |
| Moderator: Gregory Pinski ♦ Randy Bishop, Billings ♦ Stuart Kellner, Helena ♦ Bradley J. Luck, Missoula ♦ Hon. Justice Jim Regnier (retired), Lakeside |
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| 3:15 | BREAK | |
| 3:30 | Anatomy of a Residential Construction Case | |
| Glenn E. Tremper, Great Falls | ||
| 4:30 | SEMINAR ADJOURNS | |
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| Speaker Bios | ||
| Monte Beck graduated from UM School of Law in 1979. He served as a law clerk for the late U.S. District Court Judge Paul Hatfield in Great Falls until 1981. He opened his law practice in January 1982, in Bozeman. Since that time, he has been an active trial lawyer specializing in civil litigation, primarily representing individuals in personal injury, medical negligence, product liability, environmental and toxic torts, insurance and employment related claims. Recent verdicts and settlements include an $8.2 million wrongful death verdict against a retread tire manufacturer, a $1.2 million medical malpractice verdict involving the wrongful death of a 16 year old, a $2.2 million sexual assault verdict against a Kalispell businessman and a $25 million environmental tort settlement in Colstrip, Montana. Monte is a past president of MTLA and was honored with its Trial Lawyers of the Year Award in 1991. He has been selected as one of the "Best Lawyers in America" in personal injury litigation. He is past president of the Montana Chapter of ABOTA. He is a partner in Beck & Amsden in Bozeman. | ||
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| Randy Bishop practices civil trial and appellate law as a member of the firm of Bishop & Heenan in Billings, emphasizing cases involving unfair insurance claims practices and dangerous products. Randy has been listed in The Best Lawyers In America each year since 1993 and in the Mountain States Super Lawyers since 2008. Randy has received national recognition as a result of his innovative work in Weaver v. Delta Airlines Inc., where he obtained summary judgment establishing that post-traumatic stress disorder was a physical injury. He also holds the record for the largest verdict in an infant death case in Montana in Malcolm v. Evenflo, Inc., a case in which a dangerously defective child safety seat failed, causing the death of a 4 month-old infant. Mr. Bishop is of counsel with the firm of Friedman & Rubin with offices in Seattle, Bremerton and Anchorage. He practiced with Gene Jarussi until Mr. Jarussi’s retirement from active practice in December 2011. | ||
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| John Heenan practices in Billings, Montana, focusing his practice on consumer law, including consumer class actions, bank misconduct, debt collection harassment, identity theft, and unfair trade practices. He has served as co-lead counsel on several successful consumer class action cases. He received a verdict of $311,000 on behalf of a disabled Montanan subjected to debt collection harassment, one of the largest reported debt collection verdicts ever. | ||
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| Stuart Kellner earned his law degree, cum laude, from the University of Montana School of Law in 1973, where he was the associate editor of the Montana Law Review. After law school, Stu accepted a federal clerkship with U.S. District Judge Russell E. Smith from 1973-1974. He has been in private practice with Hughes, Kellner, Sullivan & Alke for 34 years, primarily involved in civil litigation. He is a Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers, and his practice now focuses solely on mediation. Contrasted with the protracted, often contentious nature of litigation, Stu appreciates the compressed intensity and the informal civility of mediation. He mediates all kinds of cases all over this great state, and enjoys the variety of issues, parties, attorneys, and interesting challenges of attempting to resolve disputes. | ||
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| Bradley J. Luck is a partner in the Missoula firm of Garlington, Lohn and Robinson. He maintains a varied insurance practice with an emphasis on the defense of unfair claims practices, legal malpractice actions and unusual cases. Brad earned his law degree, with honors, from UM School of Law in 1977. He is a past president of the Montana Defense Trial Lawyers Association and an adjunct professor teaching Workers’ Compensation Law at his alma mater. | ||
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| Justice Jim Regnier, Montana Supreme Court, 1996-2004, earned his law degree from the University of Illinois College of Law. As a practicing attorney, Justice Regnier represented a wide variety of clients with a primary emphasis in civil litigation. In his later years of private practice and again after retiring from the Court, he shifted his energies to mediation. He has served on numerous bar associations and committees and most notably he has been a contributing author to the Montana Pattern Jury Instructions for Civil Cases for the past 23 years. He has earned University of Illinois’ distinguished law graduate and MTLA’s public service awards. In 2005 he was appointed by the United States Bankruptcy Court in Wilmington, Delaware to chair an arbitration panel involving a multimillion dollar dispute between a utility provider and a major insurance carrier. Justice Regnier currently serves as presiding officer of the Montana Districting and Apportionment Commission. | ||
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| Glenn E. Tremper graduated from the University of Montana School of Law in 1987 and served as a law clerk to Chief Judge James R. Browning of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. He practiced until 1993, when he returned to Montana to join the Great Falls firm of Church, Harris, Johnson & Williams, where he served as shareholder, director and firm president. In 2007, he formed a solo practice, Glenn E. Tremper, PLLC, in which he focuses on representing injured individuals, families and businesses. His practice includes construction disputes, complex business disputes, trust, wills and fiduciary litigation, insurance disputes and personal injury. Representative reported cases include EOTT Energy Limited Partnership v. Lloyds of London and the Watkins Trust litigation. | ||
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| Gary Zadick is a member of the Great Falls firm of Ugrin, Alexander, Zadick & Higgins specializing in negligence, insurance and products liability law. In April 2000, Mr. Zadick, along with his partners Neil Ugrin, Robert James and Bert Fairclough, prevailed in the Matter of Insurance Imposed Billing Rules and Procedures. The decision is the first in the country from a court of last resort addressing the role of defense counsel. Since that time his practice has changed and is now primarily representing plaintiffs. He earned his law degree from the University of Montana School of Law in 1978 and is a member of MTLA, ABA and MDTLA. Gary is listed in The Best Lawyers in America, Chambers Leading Lawyers-USA, SuperLawyers-Mountain States, Top 100 Lawyers-Montana and Martindale Hubbell Preeminent List. In addition to representing insureds and injured persons, Gary has an active mediation/arbitration practice. | ||
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