Mikal C. Watts

mcwatts@wgclawfirm.com

“When a Fortune 500 company breached our contract, we turned to Watts Guerra Craft LLP for help. We knew that the firm was not afraid to go after a large corporation. We needed lawyers with the resources and the reputation to fight for our rights. Mikal Watts, Ed Allred, Chris Goodpastor and the entire team were exactly the solution we needed.”

Kristin K. Goodale
Austin, Texas

Mikal C. Watts earned his Bachelor of Arts with high honors from the University of Texas in 1987. He graduated with honors from UT School of Law in 1989 at the age of twenty-one, was named to the Order of the Barristers and won the Niemann Cup as the top advocate of the UT School of Law. In 1989-90, Mr. Watts worked as briefing attorney for the Honorable Thomas R. Phillips, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Texas. In 1990, he became an associate at David L. Perry & Associates and was named a partner in 1991. On April 1, 1997, Mr. Watts formed his own firm which specializes in catastrophic personal injury, product liability, mass torts, commercial and business litigation, and wrongful death. Mikal has authored and presented over 100 Continuing Legal Education (CLE) articles around the world.

He is Board Certified in Personal Injury Trial Law by the Texas Board of Legal Specialization and is an “AV” rated lawyer in Martindale-Hubbell. Mikal is licensed to practice in the state courts of Texas, the United States District Courts for the Southern, Eastern, Western and Northern Districts of Texas, before the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth and Sixth Circuits, and the United States Supreme Court. He is a member of the American Bar Association (ABA), American Association for Justice (AAJ), Attorneys’ Information Exchange Group (AIEG), Texas Trial Lawyers’ Association (TTLA), American Bar Association, State Bar of Texas, College of the State Bar of Texas, Corpus Christi Bar Association, Corpus Christi Young Lawyers’ Association (CCYLA ) and is a charter member of the Reynaldo G. Garza American Inn of Court. Mikal has served as a member of the Board of Directors of AIEG, TTLA, Trial Lawyers for Public Justice (TLPJ). He has served as Co-Chair of AIEG’s Chrysler Minivan Lift-gate Latch Litigation Subgroup, as chair of the State Court Liaison Committee of the Ford Explorer/Firestone Tire federal multidistrict litigation, as lead Plaintiffs Counsel in MDL 1804, In Re Stand ‘N Seal Litigation, as lead trial counsel for the consolidated cases arising from the Queen Isabella Causeway barge/bridge collapse disaster, and was a member of the Silica MDL 1553 Plaintiffs’ Executive Committee, as Plaintiffs’ Liaison Counsel.

In 2001, Texas Lawyer selected Mr. Watts as the “Impact Player of the Year.” In 2002, National Law Journal named him "one of the best trial lawyers in the country.” Texas Monthly named Mr. Watts one of “Texas’ Super Lawyers.” In 2004, USA Today noted that Watts “has soared to the top of the highly-competitive personal injury law business” and the Wall Street Journal tabbed Watts “a rising star of the plaintiff’s bar.” Mikal obtained the nation’s first jury award involving the withdrawn diabetes drug Rezulin (Margie Sanchez, et al. v. Parke-Davis, et al); the nation’s first jury award involving the recalled Sulzer hip implants (Rupp, et al. v. Sulzer Orthopedics, Inc.); and in January 2001, he settled Bailey v. Ford Motor Company and Bridgestone/Firestone on the eve of the first national post-recall trial in the tread separation/vehicle stability cases. Mikal has achieved outstanding verdicts and settlements for his clients.