Nashville’s Personal Injury Lawyer of the Year Fights Hard
Named the “Personal Injury Lawyer of the Year” in Nashville, Randall L. Kinnard has developed a strong reputation for going to war for his clients— and achieving numerous victories— during his 30-year career as a trial attorney.
In one of Kinnard’s many high-profile cases, he won $6.5 million for a woman who suffered a brain injury after a tubal ligation. At the time, 1987, the record verdict for any case in Middle Tennessee had been $1 million. In fact, this was the same amount that the insurance company offered Kinnard’s client to settle. But this wasn’t enough.
Kinnard calculated what his client would need to finance her care for the rest of her life. The figure was $1.3 million, and Kinnard refused to accept a penny less. The insurance company refused, and Kinnard tried the case. During the case, people with the hospital made derogatory comments to Kinnard about his client. They said that because she had four children out of wedlock, she was not entitled to the same amount a married woman would receive.
“This infuriated me, and I was on fire the whole trial,” Kinnard says. “As it turned out, the jury agreed with my client and awarded her $6.5 million.”
Kinnard was used to fighting for others long before he stepped into a court room or even cracked open a law book. A combat Airborne Ranger and West Point graduate, Kinnard earned the Vietnamese Cross of Gallantry, Purple Heart, and a Bronze Star for Valor and Air Medal for 28 assaults in combat during his two tours in Vietnam.
“In the military, you learn that there is no room for error,” Kinnard says. “You learn to ‘pay the price’ and that success is not just going to happen. You have to make it happen.”
Values of courage and selflessness were honed through his combat experience in Vietnam. He learned how to respond under enemy fire, make critical decisions in life and death situations, and to put the value of another person’s life before his own. After his service, Kinnard decided to become a lawyer because he thrives on intense competition and adrenalin.
“Combat produces the greatest adrenalin you can ever experience,” he says. “I figured court room battle would be about as close as you could come. It turns out that I was right.
As he approached graduation from law school, some attorneys advised Kinnard that he had the demeanor to make a good defense lawyer.
“The trouble with that suggestion was that I did not Randy Kinnard Nashville’s Personal Injury Lawyer of the Year Fights Hard want to defend people or corporations who had hurt people,” says Kinnard, who focuses on helping injured people in vehicular accidents, product liability, wrongful death, medical malpractice and personal injury cases. “By nature, I want to help people who have been hurt. I feel fulfilled when I am able to help someone who has been wrongfully hurt, or help a family who has lost a loved one.”
Early in his career, Kinnard had an opportunity to clerk for fellow West Point graduate, James Cox, whom Kinnard refers to as Tennessee’s best personal injury lawyer during the time that he was in law school.
“He shared many secrets of the practice of trial work with me, even though I was not even out of law school yet,” Kinnard says. “When I started actual practice, I was ahead of the game.”
Last year, the Inner Circle of Advocates, an invitation-only group made up of the 100 best plaintiff lawyers in the United States, selected Kinnard to join its ranks. He is one out of two of the organization’s members from Tennessee. Kinnard attributes his success to the skills he learned in combat, specifically being able to survive through tough, stressful times.
“It always helps to have the support of a good, understanding wife, who is there behind you when you limp home at night,” says Kinnard, who defines his greatest personal achievements as marrying his wife, Peggy, and becoming a father to his children, Cannon and Jessica.
Kinnard’s rich understanding of the experience of military servicemen and women, and the impact of service on families, compels him to give back to the military community through various firm initiatives.
“Our troops have been asked to endure multiple tours of combat since 9/11. Some of them only have a few months with their families before they are ordered to go back to combat yet again,” he says. “Not only does this inevitably stress the individual combatant, it strains their families, sometimes to the breaking point. The suicide rate is dreadful. I know well what these military people are going through. I strongly believe that we owe them.”
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–Ashley Cisneros
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Ashley Cisneros is a co-founder of Chatter Buzz Media, an Orlando Internet marketing firm that helps companies and organizations engage with their target markets through inbound marketing via the Internet. Chatter Buzz Media, which won the Social Madness competition for the Orlando small business market, is a full-service digital marketing firm specializing in website design, search engine optimization (SEO), social media marketing and content creation. Prior to founding Chatter Buzz, Ashley worked as a newspaper reporter, magazine editor, technical writer, marketing manager, public relations practitioner and freelance journalist. To see Ashley’s content writing, visit www.ashleycisneros.com. You can also reach Ashley on her Google profile.
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