For 12 years, I worked FOR the insurance companies. Now I work against them — for you.
I spent more than a decade of my legal career defending insurers in car accident and catastrophic trucking cases, including at Lewis Brisbois, one of the largest defense firms in the country. I learned exactly how insurance companies decide what your claim is worth, which tactics they use to pay you less, and how they fight. Now I use every bit of that knowledge against them, for the people they used to pay me to fight against.
Blase’s Story: From the Ballfield to the Courtroom
When I was a kid, I wanted to be a professional baseball player, not an attorney. But like most teenage boys, reality eventually stepped up to the plate. I needed a career that would pay the bills, and baseball wasn’t going to do that. So I chose law school, not because I had a lifelong dream of being a lawyer, but because I wanted to make an honest living without compromising my beliefs.
After graduating from LSU Law, I began my career defending a local insurance company in car accident cases. It didn’t take long to learn the playbook: insurance companies have strategies designed to protect their bottom line, often by minimizing what injured people receive. I also saw the other side – people who exaggerated claims, which taught me how complicated and human this system really is.
In 2008, chasing a bit of adventure, my wife and I moved to Arizona, where I joined a prominent insurance defense firm specializing in catastrophic trucking accidents. That’s where I learned truck cases are a different game entirely. Later, at Lewis Brisbois, a national firm with more than 1,000 lawyers, I defended some of the largest insurers and corporations in the country. It sharpened my understanding of how the other side thinks, and how to beat them at their own game.
In 2011, we came home to Louisiana to be near family. Over the years our family grew to six incredible kids, which is a constant reminder of why family means everything. By 2014, I was ready for a new swing, and I opened my own firm with one goal: to show my kids that hard work, honesty, and doing the right thing can still lead to success.
Today, my wife Erica and I focus exclusively on helping injury victims rebuild after life-changing accidents. I use the same strategies I once saw from the inside – but now, for people, not against them. Helping families get back on their feet is far more rewarding than protecting an insurance company’s profits.
And that’s just my day job. After hours, I’m usually running kids to baseball, dance, or a weekend tournament cheering from the bleachers or coaching from the sidelines. When we finally make it home, there are still cartoon villains to conquer and Lego bandits to chase down. But I wouldn’t change a thing.
Keenan Trial Institute Graduate
I’m a graduate of the Keenan Trial Institute, a national training program for trial lawyers who represent injured people. The Institute was founded by Don Keenan, a nationally known trial lawyer who teaches his method to lawyers across the country, and author of The Keenan Edge books. He co-created the trial method many lawyers know as the “Reptile,” which he later renamed the Edge: show the jury the basic safety rule the other side broke, and how that choice puts everyone in the community at risk. When I defended insurance companies, the defense side studied that method closely. Now I use it for my clients.
Graduating means completing seven of the Institute’s nine core courses. No one can start until they finish an online prerequisite and the required first course, Rules and Case Selection. Each course is two full days of in-person training in a group of fewer than eight lawyers, so seven courses means at least fourteen full days in the classroom, plus the travel to get there.
Each course also comes with work outside the classroom: assigned readings and homework before class, and a real case that every lawyer submits for the instructor to review in advance. In class, we work that case on our feet in front of the group. We write the safety rules the other side broke, run mock focus groups with live participants, role-play depositions and trial with the other lawyers, and present to classmates and faculty. The instructors evaluate each lawyer’s work, and then we do it again, better.
Graduates can go on to the Institute’s advanced graduate courses, such as cross-examination, direct examination and trial management.
What that means for you: I am trained and ready to take your case in front of a jury if that is what it takes.
Most injury cases settle, and many should. But I spent 12 years on the insurance companies’ side, and I know how they decide what to offer. One of the first things they weigh is whether your lawyer will actually try the case. A lawyer who has never prepared for trial gets a different number than one who has.
So I build your case from the first day as if a jury will hear it. The safety rules, the focus groups, the depositions and the witness preparation are done the way the Keenan Trial Institute trains lawyers to do them. The insurance company sees that from the start, and it has to take your case seriously.
Bar Admissions and Courts
I’m licensed to practice law in Louisiana and Arizona, and I’m admitted to practice in:
- All Louisiana State Courts
- All Arizona State Courts
- United States District Court for the Western District of Louisiana
- United States District Court for the Middle District of Louisiana
- United States District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana
- United States District Court for the District of Arizona
- United States Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit
- United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit
Talk to the lawyer who spent 12 years on the insurance companies’ side
Free consultation. No fee unless we win. Call (337) 347-7177.