Grace’s Background

“I have a degree in Sociology and Behavior Analysis. And when I got those degrees from the University of North Texas, I never really anticipated how that would work to my favor. But I think both of those have helped me very much in understanding the group think that goes on in a jury.”

Most Rewarding Part of the Job

“We’ve increased the quality of life for people who have been severely injured, and we’ve actually had the opportunity to save some lives in civil cases.”

A Memorable Case

“One of our clients had an injury where his ureter was nicked during a surgery. Rather than admit that he made an error, the surgeon continued to deny that he ever made this injury, and our client had a prolonged course of treatment, including other surgeries. He ended up owing over a million dollars in medical expenses that his health insurance company (through his employer) paid. What was remarkable about the case, from my perspective, is when the insurance company came to us and said, ‘share your settlement with us and pay us back the million dollars that we paid for your medical expenses,’ we were able to go through the billing codes that the doctor had written down for the diagnoses, which explained why all that treatment was necessary. Of course, he never admitted that he injured the ureter, so none of those billing codes were for a ureter injury. Consequently, we were able to satisfy that subrogation claim with the insurance company for tens of thousands of dollars, rather than over millions of dollars. It was a great result for our client.”

Outside of the Office…

“I’m a beekeeper! I have kept bees for the last three or four years, and I have found that studying their society is also very interesting with my sociology background.”

What it takes to be a Trial Lawyer?

“If a young lawyer came to me and wanted advice on how to best prepare for the courtroom, I would say first, get yourself some trials. Every case out there doesn’t have to be a multimillion-dollar case. And the way you develop your skills is twofold: One, it’s to try cases. Two, it’s continuing education. Even after 25 years, I’m constantly going to classes and developing my skills. We are always trying to improve.”