Editorial
Front Page - Friday, May 28, 2010
Lawyer brings skills to bear on complex cases
David Laprad
Attorney Timothy Mickel practices law at Husch Blackwell Sanders. He specializes in complex business litigation cases.
- David Laprad
Are people born to do something specific, with every bend and turn they encounter a part of the road that’s guiding them to their destiny? Or do certain individuals merely lean toward a particular role in society by nature of who they are?
The life of attorney Timothy Mickel could provide the basis for a good argument either way.
His grandfather, noting that the 6-year-old Mickel asked a lot of questions and loved to talk, said he’d end up being either a lawyer or a preacher. Not only that, but Mickel grew up in Dayton, Tenn., home of the Scopes Trial. As far back as Mickel can remember, the law was a big part of life in Dayton because of the famous hearing that took place in its courtroom.
There weren’t any lawyers in Mickel’s family, however, so it’s unlikely his granddad’s casual remark had a formative effect on the child. What’s more, once Mickel hit middle school, football took center stage until he graduated from Rhea County High School.
When the time for Mickel to attend college arrived, Sewanee tried to recruit him to play football for the school, but the young man was ready to go in a different direction. “I had spent most of my youth playing football, so when it came time for college, I decided to go whole hog in terms of trying something different,” he says.
Did he ever. After spending his growing up years on the gridiron, Mickel dove headlong into classic languages at Vanderbilt University, taking four years of Latin and two years of Greek. He loved the material, but to appease his father, he also majored in economics.
“My dad would say it was all well and good to study Latin and Greek, but what was the end game? Where was the paycheck? So I gave him economics and he indulged my study of the classics,” Mickel says.
Mickel knew it wouldn’t hurt for him to have a background in economics. That proved to be true when he decided to attend law school at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville. Mickel had toyed with the idea of going to graduate school, but the more he’d thought about it, the more he realized he was ready to bite the bullet on something, and law seemed like the natural option.
“The idea of the noble lawyer appealed to me, having grown up in Dayton,” he says.
While at the UT College of Law, Mickel was drawn to what’s now the school’s official business curriculum. In his mind, his practice was going to involve the legal underpinnings of the business world, such as the negotiation process and how individuals and companies form contracts. But when it came to find a job, potential employers kept trying to pigeonhole Mickel as a litigator.
“I kept telling them I was a business guy, an economics major, but every firm I talked with told me I was a litigator,” he says.
After clerking for Judge Holly Kirby of the Tennessee Court of Appeals Western Division for one year, Mickel moved to Chattanooga and began working for Leitner, Williams, Dooley & Napolitan. He calls his time with the firm a period of great learning during which he gained experience in cases related to worker’s compensation, car wrecks, premises liability and professional liability, among other things.
More and more, though, Mickel realized he had a knack for a particular kind of case.
“I particularly enjoyed the larger, more complex cases, the kinds that filled a room or two with information,” he says. “The other work was challenging as well, but I seemed to have an ability to research, and write, and argue, and recognize things in those types of cases.”
Recognizing Mickel’s talents, Leitner moved him in that direction. Eventually, Mickel’s practice circled around to commercial matters, allowing him to combine his interests with the skills others saw in him. This lead to an opportunity in 2001 to join the firm now known as Husch Blackwell Sanders, which specialized in that kind of work.
Mickel still works for the firm today.
When asked if he made the right choice when he decided to attend law school, he said yes, but that there are days when he wonders why he didn’t take another path.
“I appreciate people who say if you do something you love, you’ll never work a day in your life, but it’s sometimes difficult to love at all times a profession that focuses on controversy,” he says. “But do I love the profession? Do I think the practice of law is essential and noble? Absolutely.”
To make sure he doesn’t burn out, Mickel looks for ways to get involved in his community and profession. For example, he says his work as a member of the board of governors of the Chattanooga Bar Association recharges his batteries and helps him be a better lawyer.
Mickel also spends as much time as he can with his wife, Julie, the outreach and training specialist at Siskin Children’s Institute, and their two kids: Griffin, 8, and Molly, 7.
“The both attend Bright School and are strong little characters themselves,” Mickel says. “The prevailing question around the house centers on how our children got to be that way.”
Molly has already decided she’s going to follow in her father’s footsteps and become a lawyer. She’s also informed her dad that she and her cat will be taking the office next to him. “I’ve already told my partner, Kevin Smith, that he needs to be looking for other space,” Mickel says, laughing.
Mickel likes talking about his kids, and barely contains more laughter as he relates a story about how his daughter once told her classmates that her dad was a logger.
“Given my size and Grizzly Adams appearance, I let that rumor percolate for a while,” he says.
Although down time when he and his wife can spend a few moments together is rare, they like watching birds in their backyard, where they’ve set up a number of bird houses. “I’m a family person. I love spending time with my wife and kids,” he says. “My folks were that way, so it’s the only way I know.”
Mickel is also an avid reader of Southern literature, and is a member of a club he formed with several friends that reads selections in the genre.
Having grown up in East Tennessee, Mickel also has a soft spot for fishing and hunting, but little time for either one.
Instead, his days are filled with the work he was either born to do or ended up doing because of his natural born skills and inclinations. While one could argue either way until the cows come home in Dayton, there’s no question Mickel is an asset to his firm as well as the noble profession for which he holds such high regard.
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