Biography

Lawrence was born and raised in Chicago’s Lakeview neighborhood. He attended Lane Tech High School and went on to receive his Bachelor of Arts degree at Northwestern University.  He received his Juris Doctor from DePaul University College of Law.  After law school, he started his legal career as an Assistant State’s Attorney in Cook County.  He became a supervisor of thirty other lawyers for then State’s Attorney Richard Daley.

It was a natural progression from representing victims of crime to victims of negligence and injustice.  In 1982, Lawrence left the State’s Attorneys office and worked as an associate in both defense and plaintiffs law firms.  In 1986, he founded his own firm handling a wide variety of injury and other trial cases.

Lawrence spent some of his school breaks visiting courtrooms and watching trials. He would watch lawyers arguing cases and sit by the side of the judge’s bench as a guest of family friends who were judges. They encouraged him to follow the law as a career. One judge, the late federal judge Abraham Lincoln Marovitz, had a huge influence on Lawrence’s desire to practice law. He found he enjoyed researching and looking for how issues develop and learning the history of a particular problem.

Lawrence attributes his desire to help others to his father, who practiced as a physician in Chicago. Like his father, who spent many years helping others at Cook County Hospital, Lawrence spent the first part of his legal career as a Cook County State’s Attorney representing victims of crime. He learned to care deeply about what is fair and what is right, and he is eager to help those that have been wronged.

In 1997, Lawrence and his associate started a live call-in program on Chicago Access television called “Legally Speaking”.  He fielded calls on all types of legal issues from viewers while appearing each week.  His guests included attorneys in special practice fields as well as circuit court and appellate court justices.

A high profile criminal case, resulted in Lawrence appearing before the United States Supreme Court in 2004 to participate in a crucial constitutional issue involving the right of the police to use a dog to walk around a citizen’s car after being stopped by the police.

Today, Lawrence continues his practice in both civil and criminal matters in trial and appellate courts in Illinois and throughout the United States.

Education background

• Graduate of Lane Tech High School, Northwestern University, and DePaul College of Law.

Professional Highlights

• Since 1986, Lawrence has served and helped thousands of individuals and families; his practice has been entirely referral-based from former clients, lawyers, physicians, police officers, and others. This speaks to the degree of professionalism, expertise, compassion, determination and success offered by Lawrence Hyman and his team.
• He started his legal career as an Assistant State’s Attorney (ASA) under former State’s Attorney Bernard Carey and former State’s Attorney and then-Mayor Richard M. Daley.
• Appointed by former State’s Attorney and then-Mayor Daley as a supervising attorney of 30 lawyers.
• As an ASA he tried over a hundred cases, most notably convicting the man who shot and killed Chicago’s First Deputy Superintendent of Police James Reardon.
• He volunteered to educate new assistant corporation counsels in the city’s training program under former Mayor Harold Washington
• In 1986, opened Lawrence H. Hyman & Associates.
• Represented clients throughout the United States, including Illinois, Wisconsin, Michigan, Indiana, Kentucky, New Jersey, New York, California, Arizona, New Mexico, Florida, and Texas.
• In 1990, represented the mother of a child who was charged with her death in the controversial and high-profile case of People v. Dowaliby.  This case received national attention in the media. It was the first time that nationally renowned expert witnesses were used in a defense in a criminal courtroom in Chicago.
• In 1994, Lawrence was a featured speaker after the Dowaliby case was selected by the Chicago Bar Association as part of the famous “Chicago Trial Series”.
• In 2004, Lawrence appeared before the U. S. Supreme Court on the Fourth Amendment issue of search and seizure using a drug sniffing dog in the case of Illinois v. Caballes.
• Over the course of the past 37 years, in personal injury cases, Lawrence Hyman has settled or recovered by trial over $75,000,000 for his clients.
• As part of his criminal defense practice, Lawrence has represented individuals charged with various crimes. These include:
  • People v. Ratliff, in which a businessman was charged with murder for hire and was found not guilty by a jury.
  • People v. Espinoza, in which the seizure of 2,300 pounds of marijuana, worth an estimated amount of $6,000,000, was suppressed by the court.
  • People v. Rito Garcia, in which a jury acquitted Mr. Garcia of possession of 3 kilograms of cocaine.
  • People v. Middleton, in which the jury acquitted the client in a self defense murder case.

Awards and achievements

Memberships

Admissions

• State of Illinois
• United States District Court, Northern, Central, and Southern District of Illinois
• Admitted to the trial bar in the following state and United States District Courts: 

• • Arizona
  • California
  • Florida
  • Indiana
  • Iowa
  • Michigan
  • Nebraska
  • New Mexico
  • New Jersey
  • New York
  • Ohio
  • Texas
  • Washington
  • Wisconsin
• United States Supreme Court