Attorney Profiles

Jim is a career civil trial lawyer with 22+ years of experience in civil litigation in federal and state courts in Northern Colorado and Wyoming. Jim's extensive state court trial experience includes over 65 trials to verdict in district court venues such as Larimer, Weld, Morgan, Logan, Boulder, Adams and Summit Counties in Colorado, and nearly all district courts in Wyoming, plus cases in the U.S. District Courts for Colorado and Wyoming.

Jim's civil trial practice was a natural progression from his prior employment with SAFECO Insurance Company, as a claims examiner, catastrophic loss claims examiner, and claim supervisor for auto, property, liability, and commercial claims in the Los Angeles, California metroplex in the early 1980's.

Since beginning his law career in Fort Collins in 1985, Jim has tried and resolved a variety of lawsuits, with emphasis in personal injury and property damage, contract and coverage disputes, commercial lines litigation, construction and construction defects, and in the direct defense of insurers against a variety of bad faith allegations. 90% of Jim's trial experience arose from the defense of civil claims, where clients are often covered by various insurance coverages. Jim has represented private citizens, small companies, and insurers and their employees to resolve and/or try various issues in both Colorado and Wyoming. Representative institutional insurers for which Jim has provided representation have included American Family Insurance Co., American States Ins. Co., United Fire & Casualty, United Services Auto Association ("USAA"), State Farm Mutual Auto Ins. Co., State Farm Fire & Casualty, AIG Insurance Co., Farmers Insurance Group of Companies, Union Insurance Company, Employer's Mutual Ins. Co, Shelter Insurance Co., Safeco Insurance Co., and Erie Insurance Group.

Jim's experience in civil procedure and expertise in commercial and construction litigation supports Jim's assignment as a mediator and arbitrator in personal injury, property damage and construction disputes where the parties have agreed to resolve their differences in mediation and/or binding arbitration.

The credo for Jim's trial practice is, and has always been to assess case issues and circumstances as early as possible, to report and to develop plans for efficient discovery and trial preparation to test the soundness of our original assessment. Finally, Jim strives to try cases where principle and economics dictate that course of action after full reporting to, and authority from the client. A representative example of Jim's work is in the attached [Trial Cross Examination of Opposing Medical Expert]