AGE: 37

PRACTICE AREA:
Family law

LAW SCHOOL:
Florida State University College of Law

UNDERGRADUATE:
Florida State University (criminology)

Dennis was a police officer before law school and knows CPR. He has traveled extensively and lived in Australia for a year during grade school, and most of his best friends are not lawyers.

Advice to a protégé: Listen to your gut feelings—don’t override them with overthinking. Never lose your ethical compass; don’t gossip; treat your staff as colleagues, not servants; take your work seriously, but don’t take yourself seriously. Don’t internalize your client’s positions.

Never lose your moral compass; get out from under the wings of your senior partners, and don’t be afraid to do new things as an attorney, which would be your first time handling a motion by yourself, the first time handling a trial by yourself or the first time you write an appellate brief.