As a third-generation trial attorney whose father and grandfather both enjoyed careers on the defense side, Anne Marie Murphy may have felt a natural pull toward the other side of the aisle. And while she followed that course in the beginning – she worked as a defense lawyer for her first six years – Murphy felt her true calling was in tackling policy issues and social injustices that affected everyday citizens.
“(Defense work) was intellectually stimulating, but I missed the human aspect I had when I was working in the (U.S.) Senate, where we were really having an impact on people’s lives, working on policy issues,” said Murphy, principal with Cotchett Pitre & McCarthy LLP. “Not that I’d ever want to be a politician myself, but I really enjoyed the practice of law, and I missed that policy aspect of work. I decided that I would be most fulfilled working on the plaintiffs’ side, and it’s been wonderful – particularly at the firm I ended up with because it really stands out as one of the firms that is involved in socially just issues.
“Not only do I do plaintiffs’ cases,” she continued, “but a lot of them end up having a very important policy aspect, whether it’s smaller elder abuse cases where you’re helping senior citizens, or a big case like our state buildings case where we sued Gov. (Arnold) Schwarzenegger for selling off our state buildings. There’s a varying range of size of cases, but that’s the theme of the work we do.” ... (To read the entire article, please click HERE)
