jim@hwnn.com
www.hwnn.com

Prior to going to law school, Jim Pratt was a competitive college athlete and then an officer in the United State Army Armor Corps. These endeavors taught him the value of discipline, mental toughness and leadership. He has applied these values to the practice of law in order to obtain the best possible result for his clients. During his over 30 years of law practice, Mr. Pratt has handled jury trials in many different areas ranging from personal injury/wrongful death to complex commercial litigation. For example, in the early ‘80s, Mr. Pratt was co-lead counsel in Burgess v. Ford, which was the first successful air bag case brought in the United States - and was featured on both 60 Minutes and The Today Show. He also served as co-lead counsel in Edwards v. General Motors, which established the doctrine of crash worthiness in Alabama; Marinelli v. Volkswagen, a case widely recognized nationally in crash worthiness litigation; Byer v. Beech, which was the first verdict against Beech Aircraft concerning the V-tail Bonanza; and McDonald v. Luxaire, which at that time was the largest verdict in the State of Alabama and which remains one of the largest wrongful death verdicts in the history of the state. Most recently Mr. Pratt served as lead Alabama counsel in a breach of fiduciary duty case brought on behalf of a federal bankruptcy trustee resulting in a settlement which the federal bankruptcy judge described as the best result he had seen in his many years on the court.