07/04/2025
“It is better to die on your feet than to live on your knees.” - Emiliano Zapata
I’ve long admired Nick Rowley, but this may be his greatest post about a verdict ever. I think it’s possible Nick may have tried more cases this year than I have in my career. And he’s been on a hot streak the likes of which we may never see again in our lifetime (think original Roger Maris level hot streak).
A $412 million verdict in November. $100 million in January. $50 million in March. $48 million in April. July? A defense verdict. (an average of $122 million per trial ain’t nothing to shake a stick at). And like all the rest of his posts, perhaps even more prominent than ever, Nick posts this today.
As someone who has had the good fortune of trying cases to 7-, 8-, and 9- figure verdicts with an incredible team, I can say from experience that I remember every defense verdict more vividly than any plaintiff’s. There is nothing more painful than holding a client’s hand after representing them for years, and listening to a jury pour them out over eternal minutes.
Four trials ago? I got defensed on essentially a rear-end motor vehicle collision. I questioned anything and everything. The training I had. The advice I’d received. Whether trial work was really what I was meant to do. Whether I was even any good at it anyway.
But a few days later, I started debugging. Who? What? When? Where? Why? How? And I threw myself into every trial skills course, trial college, and webinar I could find in the areas where I needed growth. The next trial?
$100 million. The largest verdict in Connecticut history, earned alongside my beautiful friends and colleagues, Alexa Mahony and Andrew Ranks, at Claggett, Sykes & Garza, LLC. The learning in life is in the losses. Winning is easy.
As a plaintiff’s trial lawyer, you’ll never truly find your feet until you’ve found defeat; any lossless trial lawyer is no trial lawyer at all. A courageous coward.
Normalize defeat. Acknowledging the existence of an Achille’s heel is the only way we help the next generation of trial lawyers. God knows our country needs them now more than ever. Normalize the idea that courage does not come without risk, and that there is no success without scars.
Teach them how to put on a brave face as their client falls apart. And to fight the good, post-verdict fight. But teach them also to sleep, and to eat, and to sleep, and repeat, especially after defeat. To leave space for self-doubt, or a low-key existential crisis. Be sure to talk about your own; I think they’ve earned it. Then tell them what you’ve learned along the way.
