John joined Gass Turek in 2009, bringing more than 30 years of legal experience, including 21 years as a circuit judge and ten years as a federal prosecutor. In private practice, he has applied this experience in taking on challenges in a wide range of civil, commercial, and criminal ligation. John’s breadth of experience allows for the creation of a sound and realistic strategy and the identification of the creative means often necessary to achieve the best result. It also allows him to serve as an effective neutral in the mediation and arbitration of contentious claims.

While he continues to represent currently active clients and remains available for mediations, John is presently serving as a reserve judge in Milwaukee County as part of a coordinated effort to reduce the significant case backlog that developed over the course of the Covid-19 pandemic. His commitment to this reserve judge project runs through June of 2023.

His private practice has included products liability and personal injury litigation in venues around the country. It has included contract disputes, class actions, other commercial disputes, and federal criminal matters in numerous Wisconsin counties, combined with numerous successful mediations. He has served as an expert in legal malpractice claims, and twice had the opportunity to appear in the Wisconsin Supreme Court. As a prosecutor and judge he handled or presided over nearly 700 jury trials, including any number of high-profile cases.

He has prosecuted organized crime figures and handled a sensitive inquest into a highly publicized police custody death in 2014. His judicial trial experience has included presiding over such disparate matters as the prosecution of NBA star Charles Barkley for assault, the resolution of the City of Milwaukee’s lead abatement claims against NL Industries, and over 30 homicide trials.