July 29, 2024 | Season 1 Episode 15

Michael Harris

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About the Episode

In this episode of "Celebrating Justice," we are inspired by trial lawyer Michael Harris, from the firm Jordan Law.

The son of a Bosnian immigrant, Michael’s family expected him go down the traditional paths of doctor, lawyer, or engineer but he originally pursued computer science before realizing his passion for law.

For “A Case that Matters,” Michael shares a story about Nicholas, an eighth-grade student who suffered a catastrophic injury during a PE class due to the reckless actions of his teacher, including navigating Colorado’s Governmental Immunity Act and successfully arguing that the teacher’s conduct was willful and wanton.

For his “Closing Argument”, Michael reflects on what sets him apart from his peers: a blend of humility, creativity, and a steadfast focus on the client. These qualities, he believes, are crucial in delivering justice and maintaining a balanced professional life.

Key Takeaways

The role of a trial lawyer is to advocate for the client and make a positive impact on their lives.
Creativity and storytelling skills can be valuable assets for trial lawyers in drafting briefs, arguing in court, and connecting with juries.
Trial lawyers should not take themselves too seriously and remember that their job is about serving the client, not personal ego.
Experiencing losses and setbacks is a normal part of a trial lawyer's career, and it is important to learn from these experiences and keep moving forward.

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Transcript

[Theme Song Plays]

Michael Harris: And the court reporter looks at me, he’s like, is your first deposition? I’m like, yeah… It’s the height of arrogance to think that this is about you. It’s not about you. It’s never about us. It’s always about the client… Sometimes the world can be a dark place. It’s a kid like him that gives you hope for the future. And you think, all right, maybe we’re going to be all right out here….

Narrator: Welcome to Celebrating Justice, presented by the Trial Lawyers Journal and CloudLex, the next-gen Legal Cloud built exclusively for personal injury law. Get inspired by the nation’s top trial lawyers and share in the stories that shape our pursuit of justice. Follow the podcast and join our community at triallawye2stg.wpenginepowered.com. Now here’s your host, editor of TLJ and VP of Marketing at CloudLex, Chad Sands.

Chad Sands: Welcome back friends to Celebrating Justice. In this episode, we’re honored to introduce Michael Harris from the firm, Jordan Law. As the son of an immigrant from Bosnia, Michael realized he needed to be around people and have a platform for his many opinions, guiding him toward a career in law. He shares a story about a case involving Nicholas, a young eighth grade student who suffered a horrific injury during a PE class due to reckless conduct by his teacher. As always, to get to the stories, I asked him, “Why did you want to become a trial lawyer?”

Michael Harris: The real basic answer is my mom immigrated when she was like 18 from Bosnia, and so as a first generation American kid, you get like three options, right? It’s like doctor, lawyer, or engineer. You know, I liked to run my mouth as a kid. You know, I always had an opinion. Kind of felt like a lawyer made the most sense. But ironically, when I went to college at Irvine, my undergraduate degree was originally going to be information computer science, ICS. I was going to be a computer programmer, just like my dad. He was a computer programmer. I thought it was the coolest thing in the world. And once I got into the major and realized that I was alone in the computer lab for hours on end, I very quickly realized a lot more about myself. I was like, “No, I can’t do this.” I need to be around people. I need to be talking. I need to be kind of speaking and I’ve got way too many opinions.

So I think early on, it was kind of the maturation from not necessarily just picking one of the big three that the immigrant family tells you to do, but what kind of made the most sense for my personality and kind of the way I thought and things of that nature. I don’t think I really made a decision on what kind of law I wanted to practice until, probably not even until I got almost out of law school. I kind of had ideas that I would be a criminal defense attorney. I thought that was a cool gig. You’re always kind of fighting the uphill battle and you’re expected to lose some kind of chip on the shoulder thing. I liked that. But then I took a law clerk job at a firm in Orange County that did personal injury. And it was like eight or nine attorneys in an all Jewish firm. Shout out to the Law Offices of Gene Goldsman. I love that place. They raised me. It was just such a good group of people. They taught me so much. I remember when I was moving from California to Colorado and right before I left, one of my mentors there, his name’s Fernando Brito, another shout out, love that guy. He told me, listen man, you may not be like saving the rainforest or getting people off death row or arguing before the Supreme Court every day, but you know, you can do a lot of good for people. You can help people in this field. You can make some money, have a nice life. And I remember that kind of, I don’t know, something about it sat with me and I remember thinking, “It’s a nice combo. I like that.” So that’s how I got into personal injury.

Chad Sands: And so did you leave California and you moved to Colorado and landed at a PI firm out in Colorado?

Michael Harris: Yeah. So I moved to Colorado about 12 or so years ago. Never even took the California bar, just took the Colorado bar. And then right afterwards I had a few interviews and landed a personal injury litigation job about maybe two months after I passed the bar exam. So I was pretty fortunate. It’s not like the market’s like really big in Colorado, especially for young attorneys. Worked at one firm for about three years and another firm for about another three years and then been with Jason Jordan since then. So about seven years now.

Chad Sands: What’s it like to be a young attorney at a, you know, experienced bustling PI firm when you’re having to step in?

Michael Harris: Yeah, it was definitely trial by fire. I mean, it was definitely like a lot of self-learning. I think that’s one thing. I think that’s one thing people don’t understand about law school in general. Like they think law school is like this, you know, rigorous gauntlet of, you know, mental challenges and hoops to jump through. And really it’s like a hazing experiment. Like, are you willing to read a ton of information in a relatively short period of time? And are you willing to just kind of suffer for three years. I think most people in our field would probably agree, law school doesn’t do a great job of kind of teaching how to be a lawyer, like how to practice. It teaches you kind of how to think like a lawyer and some things like that. But, I mean, that can be accomplished in the first year. So you get out of law school, you really don’t know what you’re doing. Like even if you’ve interned and you’ve clerked, you have some idea, but you don’t really know how to practice. You don’t know how to litigate a case. You’re kind of useless. Paralegals are teaching you. So when I first started practicing litigation, I was on a steep learning curve. I mean, it was tough. And my supervising attorney in my litigation department, she was great. Her name’s Breanne Faljean. I’m going to shout her out because I just think good people in my life need to be shouted out. But she kind of showed me the ropes, but she also kind of let me just do my own thing and figure it out as I went along. And I learned a lot of stuff just kind of on the job. And I think as a young attorney, if you don’t have super close mentorship during the law school days, and you’re doing summer associates and things like that, you do kind of have to figure it out on your own. And there’s nothing wrong with that, and it’s a little scary. It was a wild ride. It was fun. I remember, this is a funny story actually along those lines. I remember the first time I took my own deposition of a defendant and I’ll never forget it was this slip and fall case on ICE and I go to this deposition. I’ve got all these questions that I’ve outlined and I spent hours looking through the documents and I’m nervous as hell and stomach’s turning over and I get this deposition. There’s two older, gray-haired attorneys, each representing their respective corporate defendants, and they’re just licking their chops. You could tell they just see my green ass showing up in there in my freshly ironed suit and my tie, all tight and high. And it had to have been maybe five minutes in. I asked a question that’s not “phrased appropriately,” and you learn pretty quickly in a deposition that you can ask whatever the hell kind of question you want, however you want it. It really doesn’t matter. And both of them pipe up like objection form. I just kind of look over like, “What?” And I’m confused. I don’t really understand. I haven’t seen this before. You know, when I sat in depositions in California, the other attorneys weren’t doing that. So I kind of think about what I just asked and I’m like, “Alright, well, I guess I’ll just rephrase the question.” I rephrase the question. Objection. I must have done it like two more times. And I was so confused and I didn’t know what to do. And I was panicked. And the court reporter, I will never forget this. And I wish I still had his name to shout him out. He says, “Do you want to take a break?” And I said, “Yeah, yeah I would actually.” And so we take a break and the other attorneys get up with their client and they leave the room and they go pow wow. And the court reporter looks at me, he’s like, “It’s your first deposition?” I’m like,”Yeah.” And he’s like, “You know, they still have to answer the question, right?” And I look at him and I’m like, “Wait, what?” He’s like, “Yeah, they still have to answer the question. You know, the objection, it really doesn’t mean anything.” I could have hugged that man. I could have given him a kiss on the lips. I mean, he was my hero, right? So as soon as he says that, I think, “We’re off to the races now.” You know, they get back in there and next time I hear the objection form, which is the very next question, of course, because they know they rattled me. “Mike, you can go ahead and answer.” And they kind of look at me like, “He figured it out. He called someone or phoned a friend, right?” That was like a nice little microcosm story of what it’s like as a new attorney who doesn’t know anything about how to practice and certainly not how to litigate. And you just go through so many of those moments where you’re trying to figure out, “Is this normal? Is this not normal? This doesn’t feel normal.” So it was an experience, that’s for sure.

Chad Sands: Love that story. Tell me what sets you apart from your peers in the trial lawyer community. What makes you unique?

Michael Harris: You know, probably a couple of things. One, I don’t take myself too seriously. You meet a lot of lawyers out there and some lawyers, they want to tell you about all their war stories and the new Maserati and these just famous anecdotes. They have a really self-important view and they’re just very interested in making sure that you know that they’re a big deal. I just kind of don’t give a shit if I’m being honest. I think I’m good at my job. I think I’m a good lawyer. But there’s always a lawyer out there that’s better than me. There’s always some stuff I don’t know. There’s always something I need to learn and something I’m to figure out three years from now and be like, “Damn, I wish I had known that back in year five or six.” And I just don’t think that’s a common thing in our field. I think maybe the younger lawyers, maybe people in my age range are starting to be a little bit more like, “This is a career.” Yes, it’s a job and yes, we’re doing good things, but also this doesn’t define us. This is not who we are in our entirety. We have other things that we love to do and other interests and there’s a life beyond the courtroom. And so while this is fun and great and we’re good at it and we’re smart and we got zero fucks to give, so to speak, it’s just we don’t take ourselves so seriously. So I think that’s one. I think you’re going to find a lot of attorneys who just feel very self-important. Then you’re going to see some folks that are more like me. They just know it’s not that big a deal. Like we went to law school, we did a thing, we’re lawyering. Great. I think the other thing though that’s probably real personal is I love to write. And in my free time, I’ll write creatively, short stories, whatever. And I think that’s helpful. I think my ability to kind of ruminate and daydream and put it down on paper and kind of weave tales and spin some stories, I think that’s an edge. I think it’s an edge when I’m drafting briefs. I think it’s an edge when I’m trying to convince the mediator, when I’m arguing in front of a judge, when I’m speaking to a jury. I think that’s all a benefit. I don’t know that a lot of lawyers are super creative. I think in the personal injury world, you definitely have more creative lawyers. But I’ve definitely met many that maybe should have been tax lawyers. You can just kind of tell some folks are a little more creative and a little bit more personable and like to kind of get in the clouds. And some are just a little more rigid and traditional. And so I think the creative side of me kind of helps in that, you know, I kind of look at things from a different perspective. I try to tell stories and, you know, when I’m presented with problems in my practice, I really do try to think outside of the box and kind of think, “Well, what’s an interesting way we could attack this or what’s a new kind of way of looking at this that might be helpful?”

Chad Sands: I know it’s hard to choose one, but could you share a case or a story about a client that you’ve had that has had a significant impact on you?

Michael Harris: Yeah, it’s actually not hard. There’s one case. It doesn’t matter what happens next to my career. This will always be the case, I think. And I can say his name. It’s OK. His name’s Nicholas, and he was an eighth grader at a charter school. And he was in PE class and they were ready to have a flag football day. And some of the other kids in the class are like, you know, we want to play tackle football because, you know, every kid wants to tackle football, even though they don’t realize how ridiculous that is. You know, the kids start chanting “tackle, tackle,” and whatnot. And the eighth grade PE teacher and all of his infinite wisdom, you know, without pads, without helmets, without any safety equipment. Just with a handbook that he signed that says, “No tackle football,” with a curriculum that says, “Just flag football,” with kids in the same age range, but very different sizes, right? Boys and girls, whatever. He says, “Sure, if everyone agrees, I’ll play all-time quarterback.” Whenever I tell the story, the minute I say that, everyone that hears it’s just like, shit, what happened next, right? And of course, lo and behold, he throws the ball on the very first play and my little guy picks up the ball and he is about half the size of everyone else in his class and specifically half the size of two boys that tackle him at the same time. And they land on him in a way where his femur dislocates from the hip socket, punctures through the back of his hip plate. Both growth plates are shattered in his leg. He cannot walk. He is crying. He’s in immediate pain, tears, lying there on the field. This is all in video, mind you. And that PE teacher kind of gives them the “Walk it off.” Literally just like, “You’re fine. Like just get up, walk it off. You’re good. You’re good.” Meanwhile, my kid is literally in tears. “It hurts, you know, I can’t move.” “No, you can do it. Like, you know, come on.” The two boys that tackle him end up walking him to the side of the field. Help him up, walk him to the side of the field. The teacher leaves for another 45 minutes for the rest of class. Doesn’t call the nurse, doesn’t take him to the nurse’s office, has a walkie talkie on him, doesn’t use it, just continues with the rest of gym class. When I tell you when I first met the parents, I think that the father, if he had been there that day, might be sitting in the jail cell today. I mean, he was understandably irate. Mother is the one that came to pick Nicholas up and she was pissed. It had been almost an hour and a half by the time they finally let her know what happened. He was the last one to leave the locker room and the two boys that tackled him had to help him to the locker room. He’s hobbling. You can see him on video hobbling from the field to the gym where the locker room was. Once he’s in there, he’s obviously having a hard time getting dressed and getting changed. And so everyone leaves and the gym teacher finally was like, “What’s going on in there?” You know, yada yada. He’s like, no understanding. “What do you think? I can’t walk, like I’m in pain.” Like finally gets him an office chair, wheels him down to the nurse’s station. He was like, “Yeah, he needs to see a doctor.” He spent the better part of a year and a half in a wheelchair. He’ll probably never run again. He can walk and, you know, he can jog, but he’s had setbacks. He’s had a dozen or so surgeries. He has the greatest attitude I’ve ever met in my life. I am so proud of this kid. He is a sweetheart of a kid. He’s got the greatest personality and doesn’t let it just affect his outlook. He’s still positive, his parents are great, and he just stuck through the process. I mean, he dealt with all the trials and tribulations of recovery and all the things they said he couldn’t do and the realization that he may never be able to run again in a meaningful way. You know, he can’t play soccer. He loves soccer, that’s something he did. It was his brothers still playing soccer. He had to see that, right? And isolated from his friends and just a horrific situation that occurred because really just a moronic decision by someone that knew better. And so the thing about it is since it was a charter school, you have a governmental immunity act here in Colorado. So it was a really tricky situation. Ultimately what happened is I didn’t see the school. I sued just a teacher. There was an insurance policy that technically covered his conduct, but I had to plead specifically that his conduct was reckless and willful and wanton to avoid the immunity hurdle for the teacher that’s laid out in the statute that would have granted him immunity. For example, if a teacher just spilled some hot coffee on a student, like they just go around the corner and they spill, they’re going to be immune. That’s mere negligence. I know, it’s nothing above and beyond. Under the GIA in Colorado, they’re off the hook. Well, if you can prove that it’s willful and wanton conduct, what that means is kind of like a reckless disregard for the safety of others. Well, you can get out of that immunity. And if you can kind of walk that line of recklessness versus intentionally doing something, you still have insurance coverage. So that’s what I chose to do. I suggest a teacher completed Willful and Wanton conduct. We ended up in a Trinity hearing, which is a kind of procedural jurisdictional hurdle where you kind of have to put on a mini trial and prove that his conduct was Wilful and Wanton. So testimony from him, the principal, all that. Won the Trinity hearing. We get appealed. We end up in front of the Court of Appeals. Got to argue in front of the Court of Appeals about whether the conducts were Willful and Wanton. So I’m doing a Court of Appeals argument via Zoom because we’re still in like, you know, COVID era. We win the Court of Appeals, you got a great ruling, and then they want to appeal to the Supreme Court of Colorado. I’m like, “You gotta be kidding me.” So finally, like, listen, enough’s enough. Like, we want the money. Like, you got a $6 million policy, we give you a very small haircut to stem the bleeding on the delay in terms of keeping this in the courts for another three years. But we want the money. Like, quit screwing around. Like, you’ve done enough. Time to be responsible. And they ultimately did. $5.8 million out of six and it was a great result. Parents were happy. I’m grateful because I know that Nicholas is gonna be okay. Like he’s gonna be alright in the future, whatever he needs treatment wise. He’s got a nice kind of little jumpstart to life in that way. It still makes me sad if I think about it sometimes, you know, him testifying, Nicholas being asked, you know, what the doctors told you about being able to run again and just seeing them up there in the wheelchair, in the witness stand, just crying. It is heartbreaking. But it’s one of those cases that reminds me why I do like my job. When days are coming that are frustrating, and you’re like, “Why the hell did I pick this career?” It’s days like that that you’re like, I get it. I joked once with his mom like, “I love Nicholas. He’s my favorite. And if Heaven forbid something happened to you and Craig in an airplane accident, just know, like I’ll take him if I need to. I don’t have kids, I don’t know that I want kids, but I’ll take him.” He was just my favorite. He just, there’s something special about him. I mean, here’s a perfect example. When it was all said and done, I remember we were having some conversation about what he wanted to do with college. Cause you know, years went by, he’s getting up there, getting ready to apply to college and stuff. He’s like, “Well, I want to go to medical school and be a doctor and be able to do for other people what my doctors did for me.” And I was just like, “Geez,” you know, that’s who we’re talking about. That’s who this kid is. Sometimes the world can be a dark place. It’s a kid like him that gives you a hope for the future. And you think, all right, maybe we’re going to be alright out here. A lot of craziness out there, but kids like him growing up, maybe we’ll be alright.

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Now here is this episode’s “Closing Argument.”

Michael Harris: Probably the most impactful moment was my very first trial that I lost. It was a contested liability case. It was a domino-effect-type car collision. And there were a couple different red cars and my client was in a red car and had been hit from behind. And they disputed that he was in the crash because there was a second crash up ahead. And they thought that, you know, we had picked the wrong crash, so to speak. And, you know, accident reconstructions are being hired. My very first trial. And I’m nervous and there’s only one question going to the jury. And it’s, “Was this individual in this crash?” And if they were, we’re getting paid. If not, it’s a loss. And I’m so confident. I prepared really well and got into a place. Think this was my second year of practice where I felt confident enough to go in there and handle business. And we lost that trial.

It was a quick deliberation and they told us no quickly. And I remember just the sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach and it just felt so bad. Probably shed some tears and was just so frustrated and felt like, man, all this work and I come out with a loss and maybe I’m not as good as I think I am or think I’m gonna be.

Another mentor I had at the time, I law clerked for him while I was waiting for the bar exam. Results come in, his name is Paul Marin, out of Long Beach, another shout out, great guy. I called him and I tell him about it he’s like, “Okay.” He’s like, “Yeah, that makes sense.” “What do you mean?” “Well, yeah, I mean, I can see how you could lose that too. I mean, sure, you’re gonna lose many more. So, test yourself up and go hang on the next one. There’ll be better cases, bigger cases. You’re gonna win some, you’re definitely gonna lose some. So what, you’re a smart guy, you’ll figure it out.”

And he was just so nonchalant and cavalier about it, but not in an indifferent way, but just, “This is what happens and this is what we do.” And this is not like a defining thing. It just teaches you something that you can use the next time around. And I think that that’s something I’ve really tried to hold onto throughout my career, is that my job is to do whatever I can within my power to make this outcome for my client and if that’s, you know, advising them to settle when they need to settle, great. If that’s advising them to go to task and go to trial and try and really get what you deserve and what’s fair, let’s do that. But no matter what happens along the way, you just have to look at it as an opportunity to put something from that experience forward in the next.

Another lawyer I once met a long time ago, I forget his name to be quite frank, he once told me, “It’s the height of arrogance to think that this is about you. It’s not about you. It’s never about us. It’s always about the client. You have your pity party for one night if you take an L and then you wake up the next day and go work for the next client that needs you. Don’t make it about yourself.” True words have really never been spoken as it relates to trial lawyers. It’s true. You just gotta do it. You take L’s, you’re gonna have great wins, you’re gonna have really crappy losses, but you get up, you do it again the next day, and you do it because those people need you to do that job.

Chad Sands: That was trial lawyer, Michael Harris. Thanks for sharing those stories. learn more about Michael, visit www.jordanlaw.com. Alright, I’m Chad Sands. Thanks for listening. See you next time.

Narrator: You’ve been listening to “Celebrating Justice” presented by CloudLex and the Trial Lawyers Journal. Remember, the stories don’t end here. Visit triallawye2stg.wpenginepowered.com to become part of our community and keep the conversation going. And for a deeper dive into the tools that empower personal injury law firms, visit www.cloudlex.com/tlj to learn more.

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