Mary Alexander, ’82

*Trial Attorney for Law Offices of Mary Alexander and Associates*

Trial lawyers might feel that they don’t get much civility from the political realm, where they are a favorite whipping boy at election time. One common refrain is that lawyers and their lawsuits create a more costly society, but consumer attorney Mary Alexander ’82 doesn’t hesitate to turn the tables on big, moneyed accusers. "We are the scapegoat, and the irony of it is we are actually the ones that stand in court for the little guy. They know we are what stands between them and being able to make products with impunity," says Alexander. The San Francisco litigator, who has scored big wins in cases ranging from a pedestrian mowed down by a San Francisco bus, to asbestos and bicycle product liability lawsuits, has been a leader in driving home those points as an activist and past president of the American Trial Lawyers Association. She also led the ATLA two years ago in fighting efforts to curtail lawsuits against drug companies and others.

During her tenure at ATLA, Alexander helped organize thousands of attorneys to provide pro-bono legal services to victims of the 9-11 terror attacks, the largest ever probono effort and one of her proudest accomplishments—"Trial lawyers at our best, doing what we do every day—representing people hurt through no fault of their own." It was her interest in health and environment that steered her to law when she began to wonder what occupational hazards might have contributed to her husband’s leukemia and what laws might have protected him. She says she decided to devote herself to "fighting for the ordinary person, fighting for the voiceless and the powerless."

"The biggest challenge of being at trial is representing the average American against great odds, large corporations that don’t treat people fairly. I feel very proud to do it," she says.

Published in Santa Clara Law, Summer/Fall 2003