Frazer, Greene, Upchurch & Baker is a nine lawyer firm devoted to excellence in the courtroom. The firm’s lawyers have trial experience ranging from Danner Frazer and Michael Upchurch, with 40 and 26 years of trial experience respectively, to younger partners and associates. Frazer, Greene represents clients in difficult, complex cases. The firm tries cases of all types, including shareholder derivative actions, toxic tort cases, professional liability, products liability, personal injury, commercial disputes, construction cases, employment and civil rights actions, arbitrations, and admiralty suits. Going to trial is routine and expected for the firm’s lawyers, and the firm is accustomed to facing aggressive and highly skilled plaintiff’s counsel. Through this extensive experience, the lawyers of Frazer, Greene have developed superior trial skills, confidence in the courtroom, and perhaps most important, judgment.

Succeeding at trial requires commitment to hard work, and this is one of the firm’s core values. The lawyers of Frazer, Greene embrace the sacrifices that are necessary to try cases, and welcome the pressure of competing in the courtroom.

Frazer, Greene’s size and philosophy enable it to handle serious, high exposure cases in a cost-effective manner. The firm staffs each case according to the potential exposure and the client’s desires. In all cases, the firm emphasizes efficiency. Discovery is done not for its own sake; it is done to accomplish specific objectives that will lead to the best possible result in the case. The firm discusses case economics as well as case strategy with the client at the beginning of the relationship, and throughout each case. How each case is staffed, and the work that is done, is carefully thought-out and tailored to the case. Billing is itemized and detailed.

The fact that the lawyers in the firm are seasoned trial attorneys not only benefits clients who go to trial, it also puts the firm’s clients in the strongest position to resolve cases before trial. The opponent knows that the firm’s lawyers are ready, willing, and most importantly, able to take the case to verdict in the courtroom. This often creates opportunities for firm clients to resolve a case early on favorable terms.

Frazer, Greene’s clients also benefit from the firm’s experience and skill in alternative dispute resolution. The firm’s lawyers have represented clients in many high-stakes, complex mediations. Mr. Upchurch has served as a mediator for over 15 years and has mediated hundreds of cases. Mr. Upchurch also serves as an arbitrator.

For many clients, trial is not the end of the legal process. Mary Margaret Bailey, a partner in the firm, specializes in appellate practice. Ms. Bailey has handled and prevailed in many serious appeals. For example, Ms. Bailey defended an appeal of a favorable summary judgment ruling for a client in a toxic tort case which produced a landmark decision by the Alabama Supreme Court limiting recoverable damages. Recently, at the request of the Alabama Defense Lawyers Association, Ms. Bailey wrote an amicus curiae brief in the appeal of a complex, consolidated pharmaceutical case.

The firm’s lawyers come from a wide variety of backgrounds, and include a former collegiate football player, an All-American collegiate swimmer, a former assistant district attorney, and an ex-Marine who served in Vietnam.

Frazer, Greene’s lawyers are active in many professional and community activities. The firm lawyers are members of prestigious national legal organizations (for example, the International Association of Defense Counsel, the Litigation Counsel of America, the American College of Trial Lawyers and the International Academy of Trial Lawyers), and have held leadership positions in organizations such as the Alabama Defense Lawyers Association (President, Director). Mr. Baker has served on the Mobile Chamber of Commerce. Mr. Mulherin is a Director of CPSI, an innovative information technology company, and also a Director of the Mulherin Home, a custodial home for mentally impaired children. Ms. Bailey is currently serving her second term representing the 13th Judicial Circuit on the Alabama Board of Bar Commissioners, and sits on the board of the Mobile Bar Foundation, the charitable arm of the Mobile Bar Association. Ms. Bailey was awarded the Legal Services of Alabama 2008 “Super Star Award” for private attorney involvement in assisting the poor and disadvantaged. Mr. Upchurch writes a regular column in the Alabama Defense Lawyers Association magazine for the mentoring of young lawyers and serves regularly on the faculty of the annual ADLA Trial Academy.

The firm is committed to diversity. Michael Upchurch was an original co-chair for the Mobile Bar Association Diversity Task Force, was a speaker at the Defense Research Institute “Diversity for Success” program in Chicago (June 2008), chaired a panel discussion on racial issues at the Mobile County/Baldwin County Bar Association Bench and Bar Conference (December 2008), and was a featured speaker on diversity in June, 2009 in Chicago at the 2009 DRI Diversity Program and also at the July 2009 meeting of the Alabama State Bar. Ms. Bailey served as chair of the Women’s Section of the Alabama State Bar from 2005 to 2007, was president of the Women’s Section of the Mobile Bar Association in 2002-2003, and currently chairs the Mobile Bar Foundation.