Sam Taylor:
My name is Sam Taylor. I have been practicing law since 1988. I graduated from the University of Texas Law School in December of 1987. I’ve been board certified in personal injury trial law and civil trial law since 1999. So most of my career I’ve handled pretty much exclusively personal injury cases, similar to asbestos cases.
I began working at the Lanier Law Firm in October of 2014. I’m currently the managing attorney of the asbestos section of the law firm. I manage a team of lawyers and staff whose sole case responsibility is asbestos cases, mesothelioma and lung cancer cases. In essence, that’s all we do. Every single day, we are looking at medical records, we are looking at asbestos exposure histories. We have an extensive electronic digital library of documents going back 30 years from which we draw on in every case.
If we identify a defendant that is going to be in our case, I can already know that within our digital library, we have documents, depositions, photographs, a lot of evidence pertaining to that company and every company that we encounter in this litigation. My team specializes in this type of litigation, and that’s the best way we can serve our clients, is the expertise that we bring in making these companies accountable for their conduct.
Personal Background
Sam E. Taylor, II joined the Lanier Law Firm in 2014 and is the Managing Attorney of the asbestos litigation section in the firm’s Houston office. Sam has been board certified in Personal Injury Trial Law by the Texas Board of Legal Specialization for over 20 years and board certified in Civil Trial Law by the National Board of Trial Advocacy for over 18 years. Sam is licensed to practice law in Texas and New Mexico. Additionally, he has received statewide recognition. In statewide surveys published in Texas Monthly magazine, Mr. Taylor was named as one of the Top Attorneys in Texas with his selection to the Texas Super Lawyers list every year since 2008. Less than 5% of the attorneys in Texas are chosen to the Texas Super Lawyers. Sam has also achieved for 19 consecutive years an AV Preeminent Rating through a strenuous Peer Review Rating process by Martindale-Hubbell, the premier attorney rating service in the United States. An AV Preeminent Rating is the highest possible rating in both legal ability and ethical standards. Recently, Mr. Taylor was nominated and selected as a Fellow of the Texas Bar Foundation.
Mr. Taylor has over 30 years of experience representing clients in state and federal courts. He has successfully tried to verdict over 50 civil jury trials in state district courts and federal district courts. As lead counsel, he has tried over 40 personal injury jury trials, including cases involving mesothelioma caused by asbestos exposure, wrongful death, quadriplegia, serious burns, brain injuries, and other serious personal injuries. As lead counsel, he has handled serious personal injury cases involving truck wrecks, automobile and motorcycle accidents, train crossings, medical and dental malpractice, and construction site injuries. He served as lead counsel in a successful class action certification hearing against IBM. Mr. Taylor has also tried as lead counsel multiple child custody jury trials and also served as co-lead attorney in a fourteen day capital murder jury trial.
Mr. Taylor attended law school at the University of Texas School of Law. While in law school, he worked in the opinions division of the Texas Attorney General’s Office. While attending undergraduate school at Tarleton State University, Mr. Taylor obtained invaluable experience in government when he dedicated a semester to working full time as an administrative assistant to Senator Bob Glasgow in the Texas Senate during the 69th Texas Legislative Session.
A strong believer in public service, Mr. Taylor has donated much of his time to serving on various boards and committees. He has served as a commissioner on his local planning and zoning commission, the high school athletic booster club board of directors, the livestock association board of directors, the CASA board of directors, and as a coach and mentor for numerous parks and recreation programs for youth. Mr. Taylor also successfully ran for public office twice when he was elected to the city council.
