Litigation Practitioner: Tracy Spradlin

Partner/Founder , Spradlin Kennedy

Kansas City

Tracy Spradlin deals with a lot of personal injury matters, criminal defense and expungements but some cases certainly stand out more than others. 

She recalled one situation in which a client was charged with a first-degree domestic assault and was facing more than a decade in prison. She reviewed the evidence, felt the alleged victim’s testimony was not accurate and ultimately obtained a positive result for the accused.

“I just felt really good when I got to see him hug his son and get to see his family,” she said. “They’d been by his side the whole time and it was very emotional. It was a really good feeling. That was my best closing argument I’ve given.” 

Those are stories that make it all worthwhile for Spradlin, who likes to joke that she became an attorney because she’d “watched Legally Blonde too many times”. 

She eventually became interested in family and criminal law after clerking for a Columbia firm. 

“I would honestly say the most rewarding are the expungements, noted the UMKC grad. “There are not a ton of attorneys that do those and you have people who, ten or 20 years ago, got these convictions that have prevented them from moving up in their job, getting licenses, being able to rent in certain areas.” 

A graduate of the Missouri Bar Leadership Academy and a Missouri Lawyers Media Up & Coming attorney from 2017, Spradlin is a recipient of the Young Lawyer Section President’s Award for Kansas City. She is on the board of both the Kansas City Metropolitan Bar Association’s Young Lawyers Section and the Association for Women Lawyers. 

Starting her own firm in 2013, she merged to take on a partner five years later. 

She enjoys practicing criminal law. 

“I like the investigating and trying to put puzzle pieces together,” said Spradlin who has also served as municipal prosecutor in two localities. “Everybody can look at a set of facts and see it one way. If you dig a little deeper, you can uncover the layers of it and what might be going on under the surface.”