The Goal Remains the Same

While growing up in Chicago, Julius Kim attended a Catholic school for boys. Many of his classmates were the sons of police officers, which inspired Kim to think about a career in law enforcement. But his parents weren’t as excited.

“They were kind of the typical Korean parents,” Kim says. “They were like, ‘Why can’t you be a lawyer? Why can’t you be a doctor?’”

He hadn’t considered pursuing either. But on a freshman field trip to the Cook County circuit courthouse, Kim’s class met a prosecutor who happened to be Kim’s former Little League baseball coach.

“When he explained it, I thought it was the perfect hybrid between what I wanted to do in terms of being a cop, being in law enforcement, and being a lawyer, which meant keeping my parents happy,” he says.

Because of Cook County politics and his family’s lack of social status, Kim felt his chances of being hired as a prosecutor in that jurisdiction were slim. He decided to attend Marquette University Law School with the goal of someday being hired in Milwaukee County. 

Another chance meeting—this time with longtime DA E. Michael McCann, who famously prosecuted Jeffrey Dahmer—would seal Kim’s fate. At the beginning of his first year, Kim and another law student ran into McCann as he was leaving mass. Kim approached McCann, introducing himself and asking what he needed to do to get a job in the Milwaukee County District Attorney’s Office.

“He proceeded to sit there and talk to me for 20 minutes, right on Wisconsin Avenue,” Kim recalls. At the end of the conversation, McCann wrote his phone number on a deposit slip and told Kim to stay in touch.

Kim sent out only one résumé following his graduation in 1997: to the Milwaukee County DA’s office. And he got the job.

But after about five years as an assistant district attorney, Kim and his wife were drowning in student loans and wanted to start a family, so Kim decided to open a solo practice doing immigration and some criminal defense cases. The latter wound up being the majority. He compares his roughly eight-month stint in defense to earning a master’s degree—an invaluable experience that made him a better prosecutor when he went back.

“When I first got to the DA’s office … I wanted to seek justice for victims of crime, and I was just very, very focused on that goal,” he says. “When I was a defense attorney … I met a lot of really good people that realized they had screwed up or were dealing with addictions or mental health issues or some other vice and they were generally remorseful.”

During that time, Kim realized he’d been a bit naive not realizing some members of law enforcement take advantage of their power and mishandle criminal situations. He says he gained empathy for, and had more patience with, defense attorneys and their clients.

“I think the quality of my prosecution was better after that because it got me thinking about what is truly right,” Kim says.

It worked in the other direction, too. After a few more years as a prosecutor, Kim made the transition in 2004 back to defense attorney after he and a friend discussed the possibility of going out on their own. That’s when he and John LaVoy started a firm. Once again on the other side of the aisle, Kim says, “I still have a goal of trying to keep the community safe and doing justice. I realized that that comes from both sides.”

And with nearly 30 years of practice under his belt, Kim has a more balanced approach than when he was an eager young prosecutor. He still welcomes the challenge of a jury trial—he’s litigated more than 100 in his career and has won the majority of them—but his priorities have changed.

“I view my job as, number one, keeping the system fair,” he says, “along with doing whatever we can to try and make sure that someone doesn’t find themselves in that same position again.”

Kim also recently served as the president of the Wisconsin Asian American Bar Association. He helped revive the once-dormant organization, which works to build community among Asian-American attorneys in the state and provide mentorship opportunities.

His older brother, David, also became an attorney, which, of course, thrilled their parents. 

“I’m proud of the fact that through hard work, compassion and determination, I’ve been able to fulfill the American dream for my parents,” he says.