J Murray

Background

J. Michael Murray was born on June 15, 1950, in Cleveland, Ohio. Cleveland was a major industrial and manufacturing city on Lake Erie during the decades of his youth, and its legal profession had long been shaped by the downtown evening law schools that later merged into the institution he attended.

Those evening schools had served many students who worked during the day. Their history reflects the broader development of accessible legal education in the city, which later became part of the public university system of Ohio.

Education

Murray received a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Notre Dame in 1972. Notre Dame is a private Catholic university founded in 1842 near South Bend, Indiana, by the Congregation of Holy Cross.

He then studied at Cleveland-Marshall College of Law, from which he graduated in 1976 with a Juris Doctor summa cum laude. The school traces its origins to the Cleveland Law School, founded in 1897 as Ohio's first evening law school, and to the John Marshall School of Law, established in 1916. The two schools merged in 1946 to form the Cleveland-Marshall Law School.

In 1969 the law school joined Cleveland State University, a public institution that had been established in 1964 as a commuter college in downtown Cleveland. The law school, then known as the Cleveland-Marshall College of Law, was described at the time as the largest law college in Ohio. It was renamed the Cleveland State University College of Law in 2022.

Career

Murray was admitted to the Ohio bar in 1976, the year he completed his law degree. He later gained admission to the United States District Court for the Northern District of Ohio and to the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit in 1978. He was admitted to the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in 1981 and to practice before the United States Supreme Court in 1982.

Murray practiced as a partner of Berkman, Gordon, Murray & Palda, the Cleveland firm that bore that name at the time. The firm was established in 1964 and describes itself as rooted in Cleveland, where it began more than forty years ago. Its practice has covered a varied civil and criminal caseload, including constitutional litigation.

The firm later adopted the name Berkman, Gordon, Murray & DeVan, and Murray became its managing partner. In that role he has led a practice focused on First Amendment, constitutional, civil rights, and criminal defense matters, including white collar defense.

His trial experience has included civil rights actions, personal injury, product liability, medical malpractice, and business litigation, as well as white collar criminal defense and First Amendment cases. On behalf of plaintiffs, he has pursued recovery for clients injured by medical malpractice or whose civil or constitutional rights were violated.

Murray has also argued appeals in federal and state appellate courts across the country, a part of his practice that connects his trial work with the appellate review of constitutional questions.

Membership

Murray is a Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers, a fellowship of experienced trial lawyers that seeks to uphold high standards of trial advocacy, ethics, and professionalism among its members in the United States and Canada.

He has also belonged to professional associations in several areas of his practice. The Association of Trial Lawyers of America, later known as the American Association for Justice, represents lawyers who represent injured people and others in civil litigation. The Ohio State Bar Association serves as the statewide professional body for Ohio attorneys.

His criminal defense and First Amendment work connects him with the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, a national organization of defense attorneys, the Cuyahoga County Criminal Defense Lawyers Association, a local body for defense practitioners in Cleveland's home county, and the First Amendment Lawyers Association, which brings together lawyers who litigate speech and press cases.

• The Association of Trial Lawyers of America , United States

• Ohio State Bar Association , United States

• President, 1997-1998; national chairman, 1998-1999

  First Amendment Lawyers Association , United States

• National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers , United States

• Cuyahoga Criminal Defense Lawyers Association , United States

• Fellow

  American College of Trial Lawyers , United States

  October 23, 2004 - present

References

• Super Lawyers profile of J. Michael Murray Profile recording Murray's Ohio licensure in 1976, his education at Cleveland-Marshall College of Law, his constitutional law and criminal defense practice, and his Cleveland office.
• American College of Trial Lawyers Find a Fellow profile Fellow profile recording his fellowship since October 2004 and his Cleveland practice areas, including First Amendment and criminal defense.
• Berkman, Gordon, Murray & DeVan attorney profile Firm biography describing Murray as managing partner, his education, his fellowship, and his practice in First Amendment, white collar defense, and appellate advocacy.