|
| |
| Monte Beck graduated from the University of Montana 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, Montana. 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. He is a partner at Beck & Amsden, a five lawyer firm in Bozeman, Montana. Monte is a past president of MTLA and was honored with its Trial Lawyer 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 for the years 2001-2003. |
| |
| Hon. Justice Patricia O’Brien Cotter was born in South Bend, Indiana and graduated from Notre Dame Law School in 1977. After practicing law in South Bend for a number of years, she and her husband Michael moved to Montana in 1983, and began practicing law in Great Falls in 1984 with John Hoyt. In 1985, they established the law firm of Cotter & Cotter. Justice Cotter was twice honored with the Montana Trial Lawyer Association’s Public Service Award, and received the group’s Appellate Advocacy Award in 1999, after chairing the group’s Amicus Curiae committee for 7 years. Justice Cotter won election in 2000 to the Montana Supreme Court for an eight-year term and was re-elected in November, 2008. |
| |
| A. Clifford Edwards has had considerable success in the courtroom, and in the negotiation room, and has been able to significantly help many Montanans all over the state remedy wrongs that have been done to them. Cliff was named MTLA Trial Lawyer of the Year in 1996 and has been listed in the Best Lawyers in America since 1987. He was selected as one of 45 AAJ delegates to a People to People-Professional Trial Lawyers Delegation to China in the fall of 2007. Edwards has obtained two of the four highest jury verdicts ever in Montana’s history of behalf of Montanans against major U. S. Corporations. Cliff grew up in the small central Montana town of Denton, and graduated from the University of Montana School of Law in Missoula. Cliff is a sustaining member of MTLA and a member of AAJ’s Leader’s Forum. |
| |
| James E. Fitzgerald, Fitzgerald Law Firm, Cheyenne, Wyoming, limits his practice to catastrophic injury and wrongful death cases. Mr. Fitzgerald earned his B.A. degree from the University of Wyoming and his law degree from the University of Colorado. He is a member of the Inner Circle of Advocates, American Board of Trial Advocates, International Academy of Trial Lawyers, American College of Trial Lawyers, Wyoming Trial Lawyers Association (President 1978-1979), AAJ, and National Board of Trial Advocacy. James is listed in Best Lawyers in America. |
| |
| Matt Garretson earned his law degree from Northern Kentucky University’s Salmon P. Chase College of Law and his undergraduate degree from Yale University. He founded The Garretson Law Firm (Cincinnati, Ohio), which provides mass tort/class action settlement allocation and administration services. His firm also assists lawyer-clients with a variety of Medicare, Medicaid and Private Health Insurance/ERISA issues, including resolving reimbursement claims and liens in single-event and mass tort cases. Matt authored the AAJ Press/Thompson West Publishing text book Negotiating and Settling Tort Cases. He is a member of AAJ’s Leaders Forum. |
| |
| Graden Hahn joined Lamb & Carey Law as an associate attorney in January 2008 after completing her clerkship with the Honorable Justice Patricia Cotter at the Montana Supreme Court. Ms. Hahn grew up in Whitefish, Montana. She earned her juris doctorate from the University of Montana School of Law in 2005. Prior to law school, Graden staffed the Montana Environmental Information Center’s Missoula office,advocating for public participation in environmental policy making, anddefending citizens’ rights to clean air, clean water, and sustainable energysystems. |
| |
| S. Gregory Hipskind, MD, PhD, is a nationally recognized expert on the scientific validity of functional brain SPECT imaging in the evaluation of traumatic brain injury. He has been admitted as an expert witness on dozens of brain injury cases including Hoffman v. Austin, and Chilcote v. Fireman’s Fund Insurance Co. Dr. Hipskind earned his medical degree and his doctorate of neurophysiology from St. Louis University in 1978. He has written numerous professional articles and authored the chapter “Recent Advances in Brain SPECT Imaging After Carbon Monoxide Poisoning” in the 2008 medical textbook Carbon Monoxide Poisoning. Dr. Hipskind is founder, president and medical officer of Functional Brain Imaging located in Centennial, Colorado. |
| |
| State Senator Larry Jent served three terms in the Montana House before his election to the Senate in 2006. Senator Jent serves on the Senate Judiciary, State Administration, and Fish and Game committees. He is a partner in Williams & Jent and has been listed in Who's Who in American Law and Best Lawyers in America directories. An MTLA member, Larry practices in the areas of Federal and State criminal defense, plaintiff's personal injury, and professional negligence law. A 1973 West Point graduate, Jent served as a Green Beret, before receiving his law degree from the University of Colorado School of Law in 1983. Larry represented Montana at the 1996, 2000, and 2008 Democratic National Conventions. |
| |
| Edward Lazarus is a partner in the trial strategy firm Winning Works as well as the president of Lazarus Strategic Services. His clients include political campaigns, bar associations, and attorneys preparing for settlement negotiations or litigation. From 2000 through 2004 Lazarus was the Senior Vice President of State Affairs at AAJ. Lazarus earned a B.A. in Political Science from the UC San Diego in 1980 and went to graduate school and taught at Yale University from 1980 through 1983. Lazarus was a fellow at the Roosevelt Center for American Policy Studies in 1983-84, and is co-author of Third Parties in American Politics (Princeton University Press, 1984, 1996). |
| |
|
Jim Manley is a 1978 graduate of Lewis and Clark Law School, Portland, Oregon. Mr. Manley practices in Polson with his daughter, Ann Moderie. He is a member of the Montana Trial Lawyers Association’s Education and Montana Pattern Instruction Committees. Jim co-chaired MTLA’s Annual Convention in Polson for many years. Jim currently serves on the MTLA Board of Directors and is its immediate past president. He is member of the American Association for Justice and has tried over 100 jury trials.
|
| |
| Jonathan McDonald has practiced law in Helena since his admission to the State Bar of Montana in 2006. He is a partner at the firm of Dix, Hunt & McDonald and his practice focuses on personal injury litigation, insurance law and workers’ compensation. He graduated with honors from the University of Montana School of Law in 2006 and worked as a newspaper reporter for five years before attending law school. Born and raised in Nebraska, Jonathan moved to Montana in 2002 with his wife, Jennifer, a fourth-generation Montanan. They have two children, Maggie and Cormac. |
| |
| Prof. Greg Munro teaches Trial Practice, Insurance Law and Pretrial Advocacy at the University of Montana School of Law where he is a Professor and Director of Professional Skills. He has also taught Torts and Remedies and co-coached the law school’s national championship Trial Team from 1989 until 1999. He regularly teaches CLE for organizations of lawyers, judges and law professors. Munro is a past president and board member of MTLA. He regularly researches and writes the quarterly Insurance Consumer Counsel’s Column for Trial Trends. Prof. Munro has published articles, a book and book chapters on topics of insurance, torts, medical-legal and legal education. He practiced plaintiff’s civil litigation in Billings for 13 years before joining the UM School of Law in 1988. |
| |
| Dorothy Clay Sims is the founding partner in the law firm of Sims & Stakenborg and CEO of mdinabox.com, a company which trains medical doctors in developing nations to assist lawyers. She limits her practice to helping other lawyers throughout the U.S.prove the medical/disability issues in their cases. Ms. Sims spent l0 years studying the psychological and physical tests that were being given to her clients. She took the tests herself and met with doctors from all over the US to understand how to expose dishonest defense doctors when they misused the science. Dorothy has lectured extensively on medical/legal issues with a focus on direct and cross examination of medical experts hired by the defense. |
| |
| J. David Slovak graduated from UM School of Law in 1980. He is a partner with Lewis, Slovak & Kovacich, P.C., of Great Falls, Montana. The firm has a State-wide trial practice exclusively limited to plaintiff’s civil litigation. The firm’s work emphasizes toxic tort, product liability, safe place to work, and environmental litigation. Mr. Slovak is a sustaining member of MTLA and currently serves on its Board of Directors. He is annually listed in The Best Lawyers in America and Mountain States Super Lawyers for plaintiff’s personal injury litigation and is AV Peer Review Rated. Slovak received MTLA’s Trial Lawyer of the Year award in 2005 and MTLA’s Appellate Advocacy award in 2008. |
| |
|
Hon. Sidney R. Thomas was nominated by President Clinton to serve as a judge on the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in 1995. Judge Thomas is the En Banc Coordinator and Capital Case Coordinator for the Circuit. He serves on the Circuit’s Executive Committee and Judicial Council. He chairs the Circuit’s Committee on Automation and Technology. His permanent chambers are in Billings, Montana. Prior to his appointment, he was engaged in the private practice of law in Montana, with an emphasis on complex civil commercial litigation. As a private practitioner, Judge Thomas was selected as one of the Best Lawyers in America and was included from the inception of the publication.
|
