Special Licenses/Certifications:

• Georgia Registered Neutral (Mediator)
• Rule 31 Listed General Civil Mediator (by the Tennessee Supreme Court Alternative Dispute Resolution Commission)
• Admitted to practice in Georgia, 1976
• Board Certified Civil Trial Specialist (certified by the Tennessee Commission on Continuing Legal Education and Specialization and the National Board of Trial Advocacy), 1997

Bar/Professional Activity:

• Sustaining Member, Tennes­see Association for Justice; Champion Member, Georgia Trial Lawyers Association; Sustaining Member, American Association for Justice; Member, Association of Plaintiff Interstate Trucking Lawyers of America, Member, Workers' Injury Law & Advocacy Group; Member, Chattanooga Bar Association; Member, Lookout Mountain Bar Association (President 1989-1990). 
• Served on Challenge Committees for the Georgia Trial Lawyers Association in 2005-2006, and in 1987-1989, to support legal and constitutional challenges to tort reform legislation.  Represented the plaintiff in Denton v. Con-way Southern Express, 261 Ga. 41 (1991) which overturned the collateral source statute enacted as part of 1987 tort reform legislation.      

Scholarly Lectures and Writings:

• How can trial lawyers deal adjust to and live with collateral source disclosure while at the same time attacking the new law whenever possible?, Collateral Source Disclosure–Trial Practice Ideas and Suggestions, The Verdict, 1988
• Victories have been achieved at the trial court level, and cases are pending before the Georgia Supreme Court challenging the admission of collateral source evidence at trial., Challenges to Collateral Source Disclosure Pending Before Supreme Court, The Verdict, 1990
• What comes next after Denton v. Conway Southern Express, 261 Ga. 41 (1991) which declared portions of the Tort Reform Act of 1987 to be unconstitutional? , Collateral Source Battle Still Not Over, The Verdict (Journal of the Georgia Trial Lawyers Association), 1992

Verdicts and Settlements:

• Mr. Hamilton has obtained numerous seven figure settlements for severely injured clients and their families
• Currie v. Farmer, Case 08 CV 7097, Walker State Court, LaFayette, Georgia:  Jury verdict totaling $792,500, on March 11, 2010, for a 39 year-old self-employed roofer/sheet metal fabricator injured in a bad wreck two years previously. On a Sunday afternoon the plaintiff had taken his Harley motorcycle out for a ride over to his mother’s house. As he cruised along a rural roadway near Chickamauga, Georgia at a safe speed, a Buick Skylark, driven by an 88 year-old man, suddenly turned left directly in front of him. The impact shattered the plaintiff’s left ankle. The orthopedic trauma surgeon was able to use steel plates and screws to put the bimalleolar ankle fracture dislocation back together, but the plaintiff was left with a painful arthritic ankle with limited mobility.  The jury awrded $50,000 for medical expenses, $37,500 for lost earnings to date, $379,000 for future lost earnings, $20,000 for pain and suffering to date, plus $306,000 for future pain and suffering.  The biggest challenge we faced was overcoming sympathy for the defendant, who appeared in court in a wheelchair, after defense counsel made a big show of the fact that the defendant was ill.  The trial judge prohibited further appeals to sympathy and the jury took seriously our admonitions not to let “outside reasons” influence their determination of the proper amounts of money required to balance out the harms and losses the plaintiff suffered.  Justice was served. , 2010
• Jury Verdict of $784,676.65 in Fire Loss case against Nationwide Insurance Company in the Circuit Court of Hamilton County, Tennessee in a six day trial that was successfully concluded on November 9, 2011, O'Neal v. Nationwide. The fire originated in a Christmas tree that Mrs. O'Neal had just put up the night before the fire in December 2009. Nationwide refused to pay, contending that a family member had intentionally set the house on fire. The jury concluded otherwise as Plaintiff's expert had found a melted plug blade in an electrical receptacle adjacent to the tree that Natiowide's expert had missed.  The evidence suggested an electrical origin due to a short or arcing at the receptacle.  The verdict included a bad faith penalty of 18%., 2011

Representative Clients:

• Real people

Other Outstanding Achievements:

• Served as lead counsel in Denton v. Conway Southern Express, 261 Ga. 41 (1991), in which the Georgia Supreme Court declared key portions of the Tort Reform Act of 1987 to be unconstitutional.  As a result, the traditional collaterial source rule in personal injury cases was reinstated in Georgia, so that evidence of "collateral sources" of payment or benefit are not to be considered by the jury in reaching its verdict.  Collateral souces include such things as major medical insurance, disability insurance, Social Security benefits, workers compensation benefits, and so forth., 1991

Educational Background:

• Vanderbilt University, B.A., 1973