I have more than 35 years of experience in all types of dispute resolution, including trial court litigation, arbitration, and mediatiion and have always been rated by my peers in Martindale Hubbell with its very highest rating.

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A. MY UNIQUE EXPERIENCE SHOWS THAT I AM A TRULY DIFFERENT NEGOTIATOR/LITIGATOR: LITERALLY AND FIGURATIVELY A FIGHTER

    Most top lawyers profess to be “different” from other lawyers so as not to be lost in the crowd. Ironically, these lawyers claim to be different in the same way. They all claim to have great academic credentials and work experience and to be totally dedicated to their clients. My unique experiences described below show that I have those qualities, but I am also truly different in terms of:

• Toughness,
• Experience,
• Confidence,
• Work ethic,
• Perseverance, and
• Knowing when to use finesse and when to use power.

    Experience as a Lawyer

• In my last year of law school, I turned down job offers from many of the largest and most prestigious law firms in the country and chose instead to help found a new upstart firm in Atlanta named Long & Aldridge with eight other lawyers with similar academic credentials.

•  I remained at Long & Aldridge, where I served as the Head of the Litigation Department and Chairman of the Ethics and Practice Standards Committee, for 30 years and helped the firm, now named  McKenna, Long & Aldridge grow to over 500 lawyers in twelve cities in the US and Europe.

• During my 30 years at my original firm, I handled virtually every kind of business dispute imaginable, including employer-employee, noncompetition, nondisclosure, and trade secret, lender-borrower, corporate governance, business “divorce” (among partners, shareholders, etc.), intellectual property, construction, professional malpractice, contracts, business torts, and sports-related.

In addition to my litigation practice, I also developed a very strong practice in the sports world. I:

• Represented Undisputed Heavyweight Boxing Champion of the World, Evander Holyfield for twelve years, helped him earn more than $200,000,, and negotiated the largest contract for a single night performance in any field as of that time.

• I have extensive experience negotiating by myself with major corporations in the sports and entertainment industry and with such formidable forces as the legendary and notorious boxing promoter, Don King, HBO, Showtime, NBC, Madison Square Garden, MGM Grand, and others.

• Represented six other world champion boxers.

• Served as President of the Georgia Force, a team in the professional Arena Football League.

• Served as the first Commissioner of the Women’s Senior Golf Tour.

• • Represented as attorney for and advisor to the Professional Karate Association for more than 30 years.

• Represented as attorney for and advisor to the Professional Karate Association for more than 30 years.

• Co-owned, co-invented, and operated Big Stakes Match Play, a golf tournament for the best players in the world not on the PGA Tour, in which the winners won the largest purses in the history of golf, including PGA tournaments.

• After seeing many problems in professional boxing, I shocked my partners and withdrew from McKenna, Long to attempt to restructure the sport of  boxing into leagues of teams throughout the world. When the economy crashed, I opted to go back to my roots and found a new small law firm named Ichter Thomas, LLC, rather than returning to McKenna Long.

• I have worked in law firms with from four to over 500 lawyers. I am the unusual lawyer with many years of big firm experience in a small firm with all the efficiencies and advantages that a small firm has.

    Experience as a De Facto Client

• I have served as outside general counsel for approximately a dozen companies, in which, in addition to providing management advice, one of my most important functions was to manage and minimize legal services from many different lawyers and law firms while assuring successful outcomes.