JACKSON, Wyo., Aug. 14, 2025 /PRNewswire/ — Gerry Spence, the Wyoming trial lawyer whose fringed buckskin jackets, mane of blond hair, and homespun eloquence made him one of the most celebrated and successful courtroom advocates in American history, died Wednesday at the age of 96, The Spence Law Firm, LLC said today.
Over more than six decades of practice, Gerry became an unyielding champion of the powerless and a formidable adversary of corporate and governmental authority. He never lost a criminal trial and had not lost a civil case since 1969 –– a record that remains among the most extraordinary in modern American legal history.
With jurors, he mixed the cadence of a Wyoming storyteller with a tactician’s precision. “I never represent a client I don’t love,” he often said. “The jury can tell if you don’t.”
Early Life and Education
Gerry was born Jan. 8, 1929, in Laramie, Wyoming. He grew up in Sheridan and Laramie, where the rhythms of small-town life and the self-reliance of the rural West shaped his sensibilities.
At 16, he joined the Merchant Marine during the final year of World War II, sailing on supply vessels and getting his first view of the world beyond Wyoming. After returning home, he attended the University of Wyoming College of Law, graduating first in his class in 1952.
Prosecutor, Politician, and a Change in Course
Gerry began his legal career as an insurance defense attorney, representing corporations and insurers. He also served as a prosecutor, where he learned the mechanics of criminal litigation from the state’s side of the aisle.
In 1962, he ran unsuccessfully for Wyoming’s at-large congressional seat as a Republican. The experience left him wary of electoral politics and convinced him that his battles would be fought more effectively in the courtroom than on the campaign trail.
By the late 1960s, he shifted exclusively to representing plaintiffs and criminal defendants, aligning his practice with his conscience. His law firm moved from Casper to Jackson in 1978 and continues today as The Spence Law Firm, LLC. The firm’s mission remains unaltered through the work of each of the trial lawyers that lead his firm.
Landmark Cases
Gerry’s national profile soared with the Silkwood case, in which he won a $10.5 million verdict against the Kerr-McGee Corporation on behalf of the estate of Karen Silkwood, the nuclear plant worker and union activist whose mysterious 1974 death became the subject of a federal investigation and the Oscar-nominated film Silkwood.
Gerry won a $26.5 libel verdict against Penthouse Magazine for a story about Kim Pring, former Miss Wyoming. Gerry won a $52 million verdict against McDonald Corp.’s on a handshake deal between a small ice-cream manufacturer and the fast-food giant.
Gerry won the acquittal of Rock Springs, Wyoming, public safety director Ed Cantrell in a murder trial that riveted the state.
He defended Imelda Marcos, the former first lady of the Philippines, against racketeering and fraud charges in New York federal court. The trial ended in Mrs. Marcos’s acquittal, with jurors citing Gerry’s ability to humanize a polarizing figure.
Gerry represented Randy Weaver, the Idaho survivalist charged with murder and other crimes after the deadly Ruby Ridge standoff with federal agents. He secured acquittals on the most serious charges, turning the trial into a touchstone for debates over government overreach and civil liberties.
He represented Detroit trial lawyer Geoffrey Fieger, accused of illegally funneling campaign contributions to Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards in violation of federal election law. Gerry dismantled the prosecution’s case, winning acquittals on all counts.
He also won multimillion-dollar verdicts in product liability suits, including cases over unsafe vehicles, insurance fraud, and industrial accidents, often framing his arguments as moral battles against corporate neglect.
While in his 80’s, his last trial involved the representation of two innocent yet convicted men in Iowa.
Beyond the Courtroom
Gerry was a prolific author, publishing more than two dozen books over four decades. His works spanned trial strategy, memoir, social critique, visual art and poetry. They included his memoir The Making of a Country Lawyer; the bestselling How to Argue and Win Every Time; From Freedom to Slavery: The Rebirth of Tyranny in America; Bloodthirsty Bitches and Pious Pimps of Power, a critique of media and political corruption; Gunning for Justice; Murder and Madness; Trial by Fire –– an inside look at his major cases; and photography books reflecting his parallel career as an accomplished visual artist.
His writing blended legal insight with philosophy, urging lawyers to ground their advocacy in truth and human empathy, and sought to make courtroom skills accessible to ordinary readers.
In the 1990s, he became a familiar face on CNBC as a legal commentator, offering candid, plainspoken analysis of trials such as the O.J. Simpson murder case.
Philosophy and Legacy
For Gerry, trials were moral reckonings, not simply contests of skill. His fringed buckskin jackets, he insisted, were not affectations but a reflection of who he was and where he came from. “I want justice,” he told one jury, “and if justice is done, we have all won.”
Gerry continued to prolifically write, paint, photograph, and teach trial lawyers from across the nation, and enjoy time with his beautiful wife of 57 years, LaNelle “Imaging” Spence.
His legacy — in the juries he persuaded, the students he trained, and the clients whose lives he altered — was summed up in a lesson he gave to young lawyers: “When you stand for the powerless,” he said, “you stand for all of us.”
At The Spence Law Firm, we are proud and humbled to carry his legacy forward and continue to represent the poor, the injured, the forgotten and the damned.
“Lawyers should be chosen because they can demonstrate a history rich in human traits, the ability to care, the courage to fight, the will to win, a concern for the human condition, a passion for justice and simple uncompromising honesty. These are the traits of the lawyer.” – Gerry Spence.
Contact: Erin Powers, Powers MediaWorks LLC, for The Spence Law Firm, LLC, 281.703.6000, [email protected].
SOURCE The Spence Law Firm, LLC
