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After earning his J.D. in May 2002, Michael T. Roche became the fourth generation in his family to enter the legal profession. A deciding factor in attracting him to Schuyler Roche was the opportunity to work with “highly skilled and dedicated attorneys who recognize the importance of passing on their wealth of legal knowledge to the next generation of attorneys.” Our reputation for providing associates directly out of law school with hands-on experience is a fact he knew well since his father helps lead this firm. Attracting him to study law was his recognition, no doubt fueled by dinner table discussions, that “attorneys must provide meaningful advice on important matters.”

Michael intends to specialize in litigation because he believes a courtroom is the ideal forum to present conflicting ideas and theories while simultaneously persuading an independent party that one’s ideas are correct.

Soon after college graduation and before entering law school, Michael went to work in the office of the Cook County State's Attorney. There, he was assigned to a courtroom devoted to narcotics cases, a venue that demanded a thorough understanding of the criminal justice system and the relevant law applicable to each specific case—topics he had studied as an undergraduate and found fascinating. During the greater part of each day he assisted State's Attorneys in the courtroom. In addition, he spent significant time observing numerous other trials, a compelling introduction, he says, to the field of litigation.

One case Michael observed involved the trial of a man who had shot a police officer in the line of duty, ultimately paralyzing him from the neck down. The officer’s courageous testimony was something Michael says he will never forget. The trial not only proved compelling, it also taught Michael the importance of advocating zealously on a client’s behalf.

After his first year of law school, Michael returned to the Cook County State's Attorney's Office as a law clerk in the Gang Unit, experience that made indelible his decision to concentrate in litigation. Not only did he assist State's Attorneys in preparing witnesses for trial, he interviewed a number of them himself. His preparation for one case in particular included extensively researching changes in the law regarding the videotaping of interrogations and confessions—a meaningful introduction to the evolution of public policy.

For Michael’s law review article, he chose a case with which nearly everyone is familiar—Bush v. Gore—because its constitutional, political and social issues fascinated him. After a careful analysis of the substantive and procedural issues it raised, Michael concluded that the U.S. Supreme Court should have articulated a clear and definite standard for determining which votes counted and then given the Florida Board of Elections enough time to implement and count those votes. The extensive and unique research this case involved educated Michael on the importance of paying attention to detail. His resulting article, "Bush v. Gore, the Battle for the Presidency,” remains unpublished, but its submission in 2002 to the Loyola Law Journal Editorial Board won Michael approval for senior membership.

Affable—but tough when necessary—Michael currently is apprenticing with our team of securities and commodities litigators. Recently he has defended institutional brokerage houses and individual brokers in customer complaint cases and drafted:

• motions to dismiss in commercial litigation cases
• document production requests and other discovery related motions in various securities litigation cases, including cases involving trade secrets among brokers and dealers
• several briefs to the Illinois Appellate Court in a tax dispute.
  

A scholarship recipient as an undergraduate, editor-at-large for the Loyola Law Journal his third year of law school and a winner of the American Jurisprudence Award in Civil Procedure in 2002, Michael cites as his most noteworthy achievement his work in the Gang Unit for the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office.

When there, to single out one case, he assisted two attorneys on a gang-related murder trial for which he compiled all exhibits and evidence for the prosecution, drafted memos regarding the strengths and weaknesses of the case and conducted the legal research on its pivotal issue, namely, whether the evidence presented at trial was sufficient to support a first-degree murder conviction for both defendants. At the end of the trial, the State filed a motion regarding the appropriate set of jury instructions. The defense contended the evidence, at best, could only support a second-degree murder conviction; the prosecution argued the evidence clearly supported conviction for first-degree murder; the amount of potential jail time hung in the balance. If convicted of only second-degree murder, Michael notes, the defendants would likely have left prison within five years. The State of Illinois not only won that motion, he recalls with pride, but the jury also convicted both defendants of first-degree murder and sentenced each to thirty years in prison.

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