Practice Areas

Commercial Litigation | Employment Litigation | Personal Injury Defense

John helps businesses and individuals avoid, manage and resolve conflict. A skilled advisor and advocate, he has broad professional experience, including in personal injury, property damage, employment, real property and land use, construction, business litigation and constitutional and civil rights.

John has acted as lead trial counsel or co-trial counsel in numerous contested proceedings, including trials, arbitrations and administrative hearings. He has extensive experience in motion practice before state and federal courts, as well as expert and lay witness depositions and other pretrial discovery. John has worked with experts in a variety of substantive fields and negotiated settlements in very complex civil matters.

John maintains an active appellate practice, having briefed and argued cases before the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit, as well as Kansas and Missouri appellate courts.

John’s pro bono work includes counseling nonprofit social services organizations. In addition, he helped create a Medical-Legal Partnership Clinic at LMH Health (formerly Lawrence Memorial Hospital) in his role as a hospital trustee. The clinic provides legal services to poor and low-income patients whose legal problems are adversely affecting their health. Since its inception, the clinic has helped more 1,500 patients.

John served as a judicial law clerk to the Hon. Earl E. O’Connor, Chief Judge, United States District Court for the District of Kansas.

• Recognized as one of The Best Lawyers in America, 2019-present
• Named to Missouri & Kansas Super Lawyers, 2013-present
• Rated AV® Preeminent by the Martindale-Hubbell peer review rating system. This rating is given only to those lawyers who have reached the height of professional excellence.

• Presentation, The Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act, California Council of Land Trusts Annual Meeting, San Francisco 2007 and Sacramento 2008
• Presentation, Why Electronic Documents Can Put You Out of Business: A Primer on Electronic Discovery for Business Executives, multiple locations, 2007
• Article, Setting Boundaries: Boundary Disputes Often Turn on the Law of Prescriptive Easements, The Recorder, 2006
• Presentation, School Library Censorship and the First Amendment, National Library Association Annual Meeting, Portland, 1995
• Presentation, Legal Ethics in Employment Law, various locations, 1992; 1994-1996
• Article, Perjury By A Criminal Defendant, 39 Kan.L.Rev., Crim. Proc. Ed., 1991

• Kansas Bar, 1991
• Missouri Bar, 1993
• California Bar, 1998
• United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit, 1991
• United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, 2003
• United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, 2013
• United States Court for the District of Kansas, 1991
• United States Court for the Western District of Missouri, 1993
• United States Court for the Northern, Eastern, Central and Southern Districts of California, 1998
• Kansas, Missouri, and California Bar Associations
• American Bar Association
• Federal Bar Association
• Douglas County Bar Association
• United States District Court for the District of Kansas, Federal Bench-Bar Committee
• Judge Hugh Means American Inn of Court, President
• Instructor at the University of Kansas School of Law, Expert Witness Skills

• Lawrence Memorial Hospital, Board of Trustees
• Lawrence Arts Center, President of the Board of Directors
• Dru Mort Sampson Center for Diversity and Inclusion at the University of Kansas School of Law, Board of Directors
• Van Go, Inc. (social services organization serving at-risk youth), President of the Board of Directors
• Medical-Legal Partnership Clinic at LMH Health, Board of Directors
• Leadership Lawrence, Class of 2011-2012
• Leadership Kansas, Class of 2015
• United Way, Co-Chair – Professionals Division
• Trinity Episcopal Church, Vestry
• Episcopal Diocese of Kansas, Vice-Chancellor

• University of Kansas, J.D., 1991
  • Order of the Coif (top 10% of class)
  • Associate Editor, Kansas Law Review
• Kansas State University, A., 1988, cum laude
  • Phi Beta Kappa
  • Blue Key Senior Honorary Society
  • Putnam Scholar
  • Student Senator
  • Neal Atkinson Junior Leadership Scholarship Award