New Orleans Magazine has named me a Top Lawyer in Criminal Defense for 2026. This is the eleventh time I have made the list in that category, going back to 2012: 2012, 2014, 2015, 2017, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025, and now 2026.

The list is not something a lawyer can buy or campaign for. Professional Research Services, the Detroit firm that compiles it for the magazine, surveys every licensed attorney in the New Orleans area and asks one question: other than yourself, whom would you recommend in each practice area? Each lawyer gets up to three picks per specialty. The nominees are then checked against their licenses and their standing with the Louisiana State Bar, and the attorneys with the most votes make the list.

That means the people voting are the people who see my work up close. Other defense lawyers who have stood beside me at the bar. Civil lawyers who get the call when a client's son is arrested on a Saturday night and need somewhere to send him. And because voting is open to every licensed attorney, it includes prosecutors. I was one of them before I opened my practice in 2010, and many of the lawyers I worked with in the Orleans Parish District Attorney's Office are still in these courthouses. Those lawyers know exactly who comes to court prepared and who does not.

If you are reading this because you or someone you love was just arrested, here is what I would tell you. A magazine list does not win your case. Preparation does: reading every page of discovery, finding the problem with the stop or the search, knowing the judge and the prosecutor, and having a plan before the first court date. What the list does tell you is that the lawyers who watch me do that work every day would send their own people to me. Eleven votes of confidence from my peers means more to me than any advertisement could say.

I am grateful to every colleague who put my name forward again this year.

If you are facing criminal charges in Orleans, Jefferson, St. Charles, St. John, Lafourche, or Terrebonne Parish, or in federal court in the Eastern District of Louisiana, call or text me at (504) 250-6020. I have offices at 700 Camp Street in New Orleans and 230 Huey P. Long Avenue in Gretna.