The POWER List: Philip L. Willman

Brown & James, St. Louis

Phil Willman continues to rack up defense wins after his record of six verdict wins in 2019.

That year, he tried eight cases to verdict and won six of them. It was a milestone in his 40-year career, in which he’s defended medical device makers and health care providers in more than 100 trials.

His 2019 wins include the case of two St. Louis County physicians who were found not liable after a patient’s rare infection caused them to lose an eye. And another St. Louis County jury favored a defendant who referred an Illinois woman to another physician, after which she suffered partial blindness. And a jury in Madison County, Illinois, favored the defense, who faced claims that a woman died of a blood clot days after twisting her ankle.

Willman is a recent past president of DRI-The Voice of the Defense Bar, the world’s largest defense bar organization, and is a longtime member. He is a board member for the National Foundation for Judicial Excellence and a director for Lawyers for Civil Justice.

He frequently presents for the defense bar on trial tactics, medical professional liability, and other topics. He earned his law degree from Vanderbilt University in 1978.

His most recent win in 2022 was before a St. Louis County jury, who decided that a doctor was not negligent when he waited to remove a tumor during an unrelated surgery. If the doctor had tried to remove the tumor during the surgery, it could have resulted in complications.