About Joel Warner
Joel Warner is a Denver-based journalist. He is author of The Curse of the Marquis de Sade: A Notorious Scoundrel, a Mythical Manuscript, and the Biggest Scandal in Literary History, and co-author of The Humor Code: A Global Search for What Makes Things Funny. He currently serves as managing editor of the investigative news outlet The Lever, and his writing has appeared in Esquire, Wired, Men’s Journal, Men’s Health, Bloomberg Businessweek, Popular Science, Slate, and Grantland, among many other publications. His work has earned accolades from the James Beard Foundation Awards, The Best American Sports Writing anthology, as well as the Society of Professional Journalists for his Super Lawyers feature “Tackling Giants.”
Articles written by Joel Warner
Anything You Post Can and Will Be Used Against You
In December 2010, Isaiah Lester achieved a little justice for the death of his wife, Jessica. Or so he thought. Three years earlier, an Allied Concrete cement truck overturned in Charlottesville, Virginia, landing on Jessica’s car and killing her. A Virginia jury awarded Lester and his in-laws $10.6 million in a wrongful death suit against the driver and the cement company. But the victory wouldn’t last. In October 2011, Virginia Circuit Court Judge Edward L. Hogshire halved that award and …
Sales Force
Med-mal attorney Jim Leventhal went from selling suits to winning themThe opposing counsel looked at Jim Leventhal and told him he wasn’t going to win. It was 1980, and Leventhal, then 32, was taking his first medical malpractice case at his new firm to trial. The facts were in his favor: His client had been prescribed an unnecessary hysterectomy. The problem, his opponent suggested, was that Leventhal was out of his league. He was a clothing salesman turned public defender. He had no formal medical training and was facing off against two seasoned attorneys: …
Respect Your Elders
How to handle—and avoid—the rising instances of elder abuseWhen Colorado became one of the last states to require mandatory reporting of elderly abuse, neglect and exploitation in 2014, state officials expected a 15 percent increase in the number of cases reported statewide. Instead, Colorado has seen a 50 percent increase in elder abuse and exploitation reports, with 17,743 cases reported in fiscal year 2016 alone. Thanks to new reporting laws and high-profile elder exploitation cases such as those involving Brooke Astor and Mickey Rooney, more …
Navigating Colorado's Recreational Marijuana Laws
Navigating Colorado's recreational marijuana laws requires following age requirements, possession limits, smoking on private property, and avoiding blood THC level-impaired driving. Colorado bans public consumption of marijuana and has strict marijuana DUI and open container laws. Exceeding the statutory threshold for cannabis cultivation limits can lead to misdemeanor charges. Out-of-state tourists have transportation restrictions for recreational cannabis sold at a retail dispensary. Contact …
Anything You Post Can and Will Be Used Against You
The legal dos and don’ts of social mediaIn December 2010, Isaiah Lester achieved a little justice for the death of his wife, Jessica. Or so he thought. Three years earlier, an Allied Concrete cement truck overturned in Charlottesville, Virginia, landing on Jessica’s car and killing her. A Virginia jury awarded Lester and his in-laws $10.6 million in a wrongful death suit against the driver and the cement company. But the victory wouldn’t last. In October 2011, Virginia Circuit Court Judge Edward L. Hogshire halved that award and …
Reefer Sanity
Navigating Colorado’s recreational marijuana lawsIn the first 10 months after Colorado legalized and regulated marijuana use for adults, the state’s recreational and medical marijuana industries logged more than $500 million in sales—with $60 million going to the state in taxes, licenses and fees. But questions remain about how to handle a substance that’s still illegal at the federal level. Where can you smoke? Toking in public is still a no-no, and it can be expensive: up to a $999 fine. Denver criminal defense attorney David …
The Adjusters
Roberts Levin Rosenberg is the insurance when insurance isn’tInsurance policies are supposed to provide peace of mind. Sometimes they do the opposite. In July 2000, Jennifer Radil, a 19-year-old assistant counselor at a girls summer camp in western Colorado, was riding in a Jeep Cherokee on the way to a white-water rafting trip as part of Assistant Counselor Appreciation Day when the driver lost control. The Jeep rolled and Radil was thrown from it. She was left quadriplegic. Radil applied for workers’ compensation to cover her extensive expenses, but …
Marathon Man
Everyone thought Walter Sargent was crazy to open a solo practice focusing on appellate law; no one thinks that nowWalter Sargent is in his own world. Oral arguments will soon begin before the Colorado Supreme Court on Northstar Project Management v. DLR Group Inc., a lawsuit involving a construction contract for a big-name government operation, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory. On the respondent’s side, representing DLR Group, there are lawyers from big-name firms. At the petitioner’s table, representing Northstar, and arguing that the Colorado Court of Appeals erred when it found there …
Tackling Giants
Employment lawyer Diane King takes on big companies like Lockheed MartinThe Somali immigrants file in one at a time, heads bowed in shame and frustration over what they’re about to reveal. They often come to this office basement in Greeley. It’s become a community gathering sort of place for the city’s growing Somali population. They buy international calling cards, floral-print dresses and sesame oil at the makeshift store that’s crammed into one of the rooms; they eat sambuusas, the Somali equivalent of calzones, and watch soccer games on a flat-screen TV …
Recognition
John Echohawk doesn’t talk about himself in the grandiose terms others do. He doesn’t say much about how The National Law Journal has named him one of the 100 most influential lawyers in the country; or how the American Bar Association has proclaimed him a “Human Rights Hero”; or how the Center of the American West recently presented him the Wallace Stegner Award, a prize that has honored luminaries ranging from Terry Tempest Williams to John Nichols; or how Patty Limerick, …
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