What drives me as a lawyer is, I feel like we’re really helping the community, particularly in the estate planning area, helping people understand, bringing it down to their level so they can appreciate what we’re doing and why we’re doing it. I view it as an educational process and it helps that both my teacher were teachers. My dad was a college professor and my mom a first-grade teacher so I came from an educational background and that’s how I approach my practice.

Probably the most rewarding part of the practice is after a meeting having a client coming up and hugging me. And that’s wonderful. That’s a great feeling because having gone through the first estate was my dad’s who passed away of a heart attack my third year of law school and that’s why I got into estate planning. So I really have a special connection to those that have gone through that process.

I went to the University of Toledo Law School then graduated there and moved on and got a masters in taxation at New York University. I would be considered a tax lawyer by education I felt that gave me the mobility to go where I wanted to go. And it did, I interviewed in Phoenix, interviewed in San Diego and San Francisco and I felt most comfortable in Phoenix and in 1978 I joined the law firm of O’Conner, Cavanagh and was with them about 21 years. I moved on to Quarles and Brady for a couple years until 2001 when I established my own law firm and I’ve been on my own with my own law firm since 2001.

When I’m not practicing law, I’m with family. We just had our 5th grandchild and we’re expecting 16, 17, and 18 in the next six months. And every Sunday we have a family get together, you should see our table. Our table sits about 20 and that’s not enough we also have a grandchildren’s table. We are so blessed, my wife is a wonderful cook, and it matters a lot to her and it’s just a wonderful family feeling.