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The Great Trials Podcast offers a series of laid-back, casual conversations with leading trial lawyers, taking listeners "behind the scenes" of America’s greatest trials. Hosted by acclaimed trial lawyers Steve Lowry and Yvonne Godfrey, each podcast episode focuses on one important trial and includes in-depth, insightful interviews with the attorneys who successfully argued the case in front of a judge and jury.
Episodes
Tuesday Sep 17, 2019
Tuesday Sep 17, 2019
GTP Classic Replay:
The Great Trials Podcast presents Part 2 of our 2 part series on the "Stages of a Jury Trial".
Hosts Steve Lowry and Yvonne Godfrey are joined by very special guests:
Rebecca Franklin Harris - Founder of Franklin Law
Jeff Harris and Jed Manton - partners at Harris, Lowry, and Manton
To see video of the podcast, go to www.greattrialspodcast.com/
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Tuesday Sep 10, 2019
Tuesday Sep 10, 2019
GTP Classic Replay:
The Great Trials Podcast presents Part 1 of our 2 part series on the "stages of a jury trial".
Hosts Steve Lowry and Yvonne Godfrey are joined by very special guests:
Rebecca Franklin Harris - Founder of Franklin Law
Jeff Harris and Jed Manton - partners at Harris, Lowry, and Manton
Don't forget to rate and review GTP in iTunes: Click Here To Rate and Review
Tuesday Sep 03, 2019
Tuesday Sep 03, 2019
This week, your hosts Steve Lowry and Yvonne Godfrey are interviewed by the other half of the GTP team, Allison Hersh (capricorncomm.com) and Terrass "Razz" Misher (podonthego.com).
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Tuesday Aug 27, 2019
Tuesday Aug 27, 2019
This week, your hosts Steve Lowry and Yvonne Godfrey interview Mike Papantonio of Levin Papantonio ( https://www.levinlaw.com/ ).
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Case Details:
Trial Lawyer Hall of Fame inductee Mike Papantonio, a senior partner with Levin Papantonio in Pensacola, Florida, takes a deep dive into the high-profile $920 million dollar class-action settlement and multiple jury verdicts against DuPont related to the company’s West Virginia plant discharging the Teflon chemical PFOA (C8) into the air and water around the Ohio River Valley. Area citizens were exposed to a highly toxic chemical for decades, causing a number of serious health problems. This high-profile case -- which is featured in the documentary, The Devil We Know -- highlights the dangers of DuPont's chemical C8 and the connection between C8 and various forms of cancer, ulcerative colitis, and other diseases.
Guest Bio:
Mike Papantonio is a senior partner with the law firm of Levin-Papantonio. He has received numerous multi-million dollar verdicts on behalf of victims of corporate malfeasance. His award-winning work handling thousands of mass tort cases throughout the nation has helped make Levin-Papantonio one of the largest plaintiff law firms in the country.
Mr. Papantonio is a Board Certified Civil Trial Lawyer by the Florida Bar and the National Board of Trial Advocacy. He is a fellow in the International Academy of Trial Lawyers and the International Society of Barristers. He is a member of The National Trial Lawyers (past president), American Board of Trial Advocates, the American Association for Justice, the Southern Trial Lawyers Association, and the Florida Justice Association, where he served on the board of directors for five years.
Mr. Papantonio is one of the few living attorneys inducted into the Trial Lawyer Hall of Fame. He is listed in the publications Best Lawyers in America and Leading American Attorney.
Show Sponsors:
Legal Technology Services - LTSatlanta.com
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Tuesday Aug 20, 2019
Tuesday Aug 20, 2019
This week, your hosts Steve Lowry and Yvonne Godfrey interview Rachel Lanier of the Lanier Law Firm ( https://lanierlawfirm.com/ ).
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Case Details:
National Trial Lawyers Civil Plaintiff Top 40 Under 40 honoree Rachel Lanier discusses how she and other members of the Lanier Law Firm trial team secured the largest verdict in the United States in 2018. This landmark verdict secured justice for 22 women who developed ovarian cancer after continuous use of Johnson & Johnson’s best-selling baby powder and other talcum powder products containing cancer-causing asbestos. Rachel helped prove the multi-billion dollar, multi-national company had known about the asbestos for decades and covered it up with biased tests and skewed interpretations of test results. After a six-week trial, a St. Louis jury awarded $4.14 billion in punitive damages and $550 million in compensatory damages.
Guest Bio:
Rachel Lanier joined the Lanier Law Firm’s New York office as an associate in 2016 and practices in the areas of toxic torts, pharmaceutical litigation, mass torts, and product liability. In 2017, Ms. Lanier served on the Lanier Law Firm’s trial team in the Pinnacle hip implant litigation against DePuy Orthopaedics, Inc. which led to a $247 million dollar verdict in favor of plaintiffs. In 2018, Ms. Lanier was on the trial team in St. Louis, Missouri representing twenty-two plaintiffs in the Talcum Powder litigation against Johnson & Johnson, and was instrumental in obtaining the $4.7 billion dollar verdict for the plaintiffs. Most recently, Ms. Lanier was appointed to Plaintiffs’ Steering Committee for the 3M Combat Earplug Multi-District Litigation.
Ms. Lanier is dedicated to representing injured clients and their families by pursuing justice for those who have been harmed by toxic substances and defective products. Prior to joining the Lanier Law Firm, Ms. Lanier was an associate at a mid-sized firm in Manhattan, where she focused on representing individuals suffering from asbestos-induced diseases, such as mesothelioma and lung cancer.
Ms. Lanier was recognized as a 2018 New York Rising Star in the practice area of personal injury – products and is a member of the American Bar Association, American Association for Justice, New York Bar Association, and New Jersey Bar Association. She enjoys speaking at Continuing Legal Education seminars, and participated in a breakout panel at the annual Mass Torts Made Perfect seminar in Las Vegas, NV. In 2018, Ms. Lanier spoke on the recent Talc verdict at the HarrisMartin MDL Conference in Napa, CA, and presented at the HarrisMartin Talc and Asbestos Conference in Miami Beach, FL. She also participated on a panel at the Annual Complex Litigation Symposium in Louisiana and the 2019 National Trial Lawyers Summit in Miami Beach. Ms. Lanier has further been honored as a member of the National Trial Lawyers Civil Plaintiff Top 40 Under 40 and recently selected to serve on the 2019 Executive Committee for the National Trial Lawyers Top 40 Under 40.
Ms. Lanier is admitted to practice law in New York and New Jersey.
Show Sponsors:
Legal Technology Services - LTSatlanta.com
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Tuesday Aug 13, 2019
Tuesday Aug 13, 2019
This week, your hosts Steve Lowry and Yvonne Godfrey interview Tom Girardi of Girardi Keese ( https://www.girardikeese.com/ ).
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Case Details:
Legendary Los Angeles trial attorney Tom Girardi of Girardi Keese reflects upon the landmark 1993 case against Pacific Gas and Electric Company, which served as the basis for the Academy Award-winning film Erin Brockovich. Girardi represented 650 citizens of Hinkley, California, who developed high rates of cancer and other diseases from exposure to water contaminated with chromium VI and discharged by a Pacific Gas & Electric facility over a 15-year period. Following arbitration, Girardi secured a $333 million settlement for Hinkley residents.
Guest Bio:
Tom Girardi
Widely regarded by his peers as one of the nation's top trial lawyers and with nearly fifty years of experience representing victims, Thomas V. Girardi has obtained numerous multi-million dollar verdicts and settlements, handling claims involving wrongful death, commercial litigation, products liability, bad faith insurance, and toxic torts. In 2003, he received the most prestigious honor of being inducted into the Trial Lawyer Hall of Fame by the California State Bar. Mr. Girardi is a Member of the Board of Directors and former President of the prestigious International Academy of Trial Lawyers, an invitation-only worldwide organization, limited to 500 trial lawyers. Mr. Girardi is also the first trial lawyer to be appointed to the California Judicial Council, the policymaking body of the state courts.
Show Sponsors:
Legal Technology Services - LTSatlanta.com
Digital Law Marketing - DigitalLawMarketing.com
Harris, Lowry, and Manton - hlmlawfirm.com
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Tuesday Aug 06, 2019
Tuesday Aug 06, 2019
This week, your hosts Steve Lowry and Yvonne Godfrey interview Mary Koch and Keith Forman of Wais, Vogelstein, Forman, & Offutt, LLC ( https://www.malpracticeteam.com/).
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Case Details:
Wais, Vogelstein, Forman & Offutt LLC partners Mary Koch and Keith Forman discuss how they secured the largest medical malpractice verdict in U.S. history, advocating on behalf of Zubida Byrom, a child who was born with cerebral palsy due to the negligence of doctors and medical staff in treating her mother, Erica Byrom, at Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center in Baltimore, Maryland. Erica, who suffered from preeclampsia, was misinformed about Zubida’s chance of survival and signed a consent form indicating she did not wish to undergo a c-section. The impact of the induced delivery on Zubida’s brain and the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit staff’s failure to act appropriately left Zubida without oxygen, causing the baby to be born with cerebral palsy and requiring round-the-clock care for life.
Guest Bios:
Mary M. Koch
Mary McNamara Koch joined WVFO as a partner in January of 2016. Shortly after her arrival, she obtained Plaintiffs’ verdicts in two medical negligence cases, with one jury awarding a stroke victim over $6,000,000.00 and another jury awarding a woman with debilitating drop foot over $2,000,000.00. These successes were in keeping with her reputation of winning big cases.
Practice Areas:
In 2014, Ms. Koch spearheaded a team of attorneys that successfully negotiated the historic $37 million settlement against St. Joseph Medical Center on behalf of former patients of Dr. Mark G. Midei, a cardiologist at the hospital who was accused of performing hundreds of unnecessary cardiac stent procedures. As part of this landmark victory, Ms. Koch conducted over 100 depositions, argued many of the motions, and made the successful class action argument. In addition to giving the 273 patients financial resources, and even more important some closure so they could resume their lives, the settlement helped establish a national dialogue on unnecessary medical procedures.
Keith Forman
Keith is a partner at the firm. Since becoming an attorney, he has almost exclusively represented minor children injured as a result of obstetrical or neonatal malpractice. Keith is licensed to practice in Maryland, the District of Columbia and Minnesota.
In 2012 and 2013, he was instrumental in the firm obtaining three of the four largest verdicts in medical malpractice cases in Maryland history – a $55 million dollar verdict against Johns Hopkins Hospital, a $21 million dollar verdict against Harbor Hospital, and a $15.6 million dollar verdict against a nurse-midwife and a hospital in Prince George’s County, Maryland.
In 2019, Keith was part of the trial team that obtained what is believed to be the largest verdict in a medical malpractice case in the history of the United States of America - a $229 million dollar verdict against Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center for a child who was injured at birth and suffers cerebral palsy as a result.
Show Sponsors:
Legal Technology Services - LTSatlanta.com
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Tuesday Jul 30, 2019
Tuesday Jul 30, 2019
This week, your hosts Steve Lowry and Yvonne Godfrey interview Mikal Watts of Watts Guerra, LLP. ( https://www.wattsguerra.com/ )
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Case Details:
Mikal Watts, the founding partner of Watts Guerra LLP in Texas, has always been known as a fierce mass torts litigator with a history of winning cases against big corporations like Bridgestone/Firestone, Inc. and Ford Motor Company. Then, he was charged with 95 counts of wire fraud, mail fraud, identity theft and aggravated identity theft.
Falsely accused of stealing Social Security numbers to file claims on behalf of 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill victims, Watts discovered he was, in fact, the victim of fraud. A Mississippi-based consultant for the mass torts case and a claims manager spent millions of dollars funding their extramarital affair, rather than making sure money went to the victims of the oil spill.
Faced with a possible life sentence and the end of his legal career, Watts shares why he chose to defend himself in court, how he proved his innocence to the jury and how he defines justice now that he has experienced a trial as both a lawyer and the accused.
Guest Bios:
In August of 2002, Mr. Watts formed Watts Law Firm, L.L.P. In 2009, Mikal Watts joined forces with Francisco Guerra IV to form Watts Guerra LLP which handles catastrophic personal injury, toxic torts, product liability, automotive defects, refinery negligence, commercial trucking negligence, medical device, pharmaceutical, and commercial litigation.
Mr. Watts has been admitted to practice pro hoc vice in New, York, Alabama, Florida, New York, Minnesota, Mississippi, and California. Mr. Watts has defended punitive damages obtained in federal court by oral argument before the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.
Mr. Watts’ litigation against Bridgestone/Firestone, Inc. and Ford Motor Company resulted in resolving the most significant product liability case in the country. The terms of the settlement in the Bailey case were unprecedented in American history for a case of this type; not only monetarily, but by virtue of what the companies agreed to do with respect to the disclosure of information relating to their own investigations into the alleged defects with their products and their corporate safety policies and practices.
Watts Guerra LLP is nationally recognized as one of two firms leading in the pursuit of hundreds of claims brought nationwide against Bridgestone/Firestone, Inc. and Ford Motor Company.
Mr. Watts was instrumental in bringing to light Ford’s quiet efforts to recall these defective tires in foreign countries while consumers in the United States continued to be injured or killed riding on the same tires. This litigation and settlement has been chronicled on the ABC World News Tonight, CBS Evening News, Dateline NBC, and CNBC, and in the Wall Street Journal, USA Today, Washington Post, Associated Press, and all other major news sources in this country and around the world.
Show Sponsors:
Legal Technology Services - LTSatlanta.com
Digital Law Marketing - DigitalLawMarketing.com
Harris, Lowry, and Manton - hlmlawfirm.com
Free Resources:
Tuesday Jul 23, 2019
Tuesday Jul 23, 2019
This week, your hosts Steve Lowry and Yvonne Godfrey interview Brandon Mchugh of Tzangas Plakas Mannos Ltd. ( https://www.lawlion.com).
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Case Details:
Tzangas Plakas Mannos Ltd. attorneys Brandon McHugh and Jeananne Ayoub explain how their team secured justice for a multi-generational Ohio bakery after it was defamed as a racist business by Oberlin College administrators and students.
In November 2016, a Gibson’s Bakery employee confronted three African-American Oberlin College students for attempted shoplifting, which resulted in student protests, flyers encouraging boycotts, and the termination of the college’s business with the bakery. With no evidence of racial discrimination, Oberlin College continued to harm the bakery’s reputation and failed to retract or correct the wrongful statements, leading the jury to conclude that Oberlin College acted with actual malice that warranted punitive damages.
Guest Bio:
Brandon W. McHugh is an associate attorney with our firm. His practice includes business litigation, legal malpractice litigation, personal injury cases, and general litigation.
Mr. McHugh is a native of Summit County, Ohio and graduated summa cum laude from the University of Akron with a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science. Mr. McHugh graduated summa cum laude from the University of Akron School of Law where he received CALI Excellence for the Future Awards for obtaining the highest grades in Civil Procedure, Constitutional Law, Basic and Incorporated Business Associations, Torts, and Contracts I courses. While at Akron Law, Mr. McHugh refined his oral and written advocacy skills as a member of the Evidence Team for the Akron Law Chapter of the Moot Court Honor Society. Mr. McHugh also served as an Associate Editor for the Akron Law Review.
Mr. McHugh was admitted to the Ohio Bar in 2017, where he scored in the 100th percentile on the Ohio Bar Examination, and is licensed to practice in all courts in the State of Ohio.
Show Sponsors:
Legal Technology Services - LTSatlanta.com
Digital Law Marketing - DigitalLawMarketing.com
Harris, Lowry, and Manton - hlmlawfirm.com
Free Resources:
Tuesday Jul 16, 2019
Tuesday Jul 16, 2019
This week, your hosts Steve Lowry and Yvonne Godfrey interview Steve Vartazarian & Matt Whibley of The Vartazarian Law Firm (https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-vartazarian-law-firm/).
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Case Details:
Four-time Southern California Super Lawyer honoree Steve Vartazarian and Matt Whibley of the Vartazarian Law Firm share their strategy for holding San Bernadino County liable for its failure to follow mandatory regulations in a case of extreme child abuse against 5-year-old Noah Reed. Despite multiple reports to Children and Family Services and a visit to the home, county social workers did not implement a case plan or follow-up on Noah’s welfare. Months later, Noah lay comatose in the hospital. Today, he is confined to a wheelchair with devastating injuries, including permanent brain damage. The jury awarded $13.4 million in economic losses and $100 million in non-economic losses, which is believed to be California’s largest pain and suffering award in a case without punitive damages.
Guest Bios:
Steven Vartazarian Biography
Steve graduated cum laude from Oklahoma City University and cum laude from Thomas Jefferson School of Law. He is a member of the American Board of Trial Attorneys (ABOTA), and he serves on the Board of the Consumer Attorney's Association of Los Angeles (CAALA), the Los Angeles Trial Lawyer’s Charities (LATLC), Brain Society of California, and is a member of the Cowboy Lawyers Association and the Armenian Bar Association.
After starting out as an associate in a Los Angeles based personal injury firm, Steve opened his own firm, the Vartazarian Law Firm, in 2010. The Varazarian Law Firm prides itself on obtaining significant non-economic damages awards on cases where the economic damages are relatively low.
Awards and notes:
- two verdicts in the TopVerdict list of top 100 verdicts of 2018
- two verdicts in the TopVerdict list of top 100 verdicts of 2017
- CVN’s top 10 most impressive verdict of 2017
- winner of the DK Global Golden Advocate award in 2015
- member of the National Association of Distinguished Counsel
Matthew Whibley Biography
Matt attended the University of Ottawa in Ontario, Canada, then went on to tour the world with a platinum-selling and Grammy-nominated Canadian punk rock band. He then attended Southwestern Law School in Los Angeles, quickly obtaining numerous academic awards and scholarships eventually graduating number 1 in the school. He attended Trial Lawyers College in 2017.
Matt joined the law firm as an associate after graduating from law school in 2014. Matt handles the majority of the pre-trial litigation, depositions, and discovery for Steve’s trials as well as co-counsels the trial and handles the economic-damage witnesses.
Show Sponsors:
Legal Technology Services - LTSatlanta.com
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Free Resources: