Friday, AUGUST 15, 2025 |
In 2010, famed Connecticut trial attorney, Norm Pattis, who most recently defended the controversial pundit Alex Jones, wrote an article “Gerry Spence is Dead?”
The article written 15 years ago explored Spence’s populist rants. I wince, Pattis wrote, “a man preaches from the safety of his pleasure palace. Are those platinum chains I hear rattling as he pecks at his keyboard?”
Spence, the legendary trial attorney, from Wyoming died this week at his home in Montecito, California, at the age of 96.
His criminal cases were as famed as his thunderous defenses. The $10.5 million dollar verdict against Kerr McGee for nuclear facility whistleblower Karen Silkwood, who died in a car crash on the way to meet a New York Times reporter in 1974. The company settled out of court while not admitting any liability.
Described by his Jackson Hole law firm as “a country lawyer,” Spence famously battled big government and big corporations.
His clientele included survivalist Randy Weaver, who was charged by the federal government with multiple crimes in the infamous Ruby Ridge incident. Spence called no witnesses during the trial and won an acquittal for his client arguing that Weaver’s actions against federal authorities were justifiable self-defense.
In another famous case, Spence won a full acquittal for Rock Springs safety director Ed Cantrel in the shooting death of undercover detective Michael Rosa. The jury acquitted Cantrell after less than two hours of deliberation in a criminal case that received much national media attention.
Mr. Spence earned his law degree from the University of Wyoming Law School, graduating cum laude in 1952. In the spring of 1990, the University awarded Mr. Spence an honorary Doctor of Laws degree and he has been recognized by the American Academy of Achievement for law and letters.
As the obituary on his law firm’s web site notes, Spence worked for insurance companies early in his career. Then at a “pivotal moment in his career,” he saw the light and began defending common people against the big companies.
Spence died Wednesday in California at the age of 98.
