Awards & Honors
Our local team of criminal defense lawyers have been honored and recognized by many top-notch law review websites, publications, and companies, as well as numerous local and regional awards in the Southwest Missouri and Springfield area.
Listed below are some of the accolades our defense lawyers have received.
Years our lawyers have been featured in Best Lawyers: 2007-present
Best Lawyers is the oldest and most respected peer-review publication in the legal profession. A listing in Best Lawyers is widely regarded by both clients and legal professionals as a significant honor, conferred on a lawyer by his or her peers.
For more than three decades, Best Lawyers lists have earned the respect of the profession, the media, and the public, as the most reliable, unbiased source of legal referrals anywhere. Their lists of outstanding attorneys are compiled by conducting exhaustive peer-review surveys in which tens of thousands of leading lawyers confidentially evaluate their professional peers. Lawyers are not allowed to pay to participate in or be included on any of their lists.
Years our lawyers have been featured in Super Lawyers: 2006-present
Super Lawyers is a rating service of outstanding lawyers from more than 70 practice areas who have attained a high-degree of peer recognition and professional achievement. The selection process includes independent research, peer nominations and peer evaluations.
Super Lawyers Magazine features the list and profiles of selected attorneys and is distributed to attorneys in the state or region and the ABA-accredited law school libraries. Super Lawyers is also published as a special section in leading city and regional magazines across the country
Joseph Passanise: 2007-present
The National Trial Lawyers’ mission is to promote excellence in the legal profession through advocacy training, networking and education of trial lawyers.
The National Trial Lawyers promotes and endorses legal educational programs, including its annual Trial Lawyers Submit. Their goal is to enable members to draw upon the association’s strong training, educational and networking resources so they may have benefits that were either unavailable or difficult to find on their own.
Our Lawyer’s Avvo scores:
Joe Passanise: 10/10 – Superb
The Avvo Rating is how Avvo evaluates a lawyer’s background, based on the information that they know about the lawyer. The rating is calculated using a mathematical model that considers the information shown in a lawyer’s profile, including a lawyer’s years in practice, disciplinary history, professional achievements and industry recognition – all factors that, in their opinion, are relevant to assessing a lawyer’s qualifications.
They periodically collect background data from multiple sources, including state bar associations, court records, lawyer websites, and information that lawyers choose to provide to Avvo. There is no favoritism in choosing Avvo ratings and Lawyers cannot pay to change their rankings.
His peers recognized Joe Passanise as a “Who’s Who American Lawyer” in 2009.
Cambridge Who’s Who is the world’s leading publisher of professional, executive and entrepreneur biographies, dedicated to empowering our 400,000 members with effective branding tools to help them achieve success.Their membership base is international, with the majority of individuals residing in English-speaking countries such as the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and England.
Joseph Passanise was recognized in 2008 with the Springfield Metropolitan Bar Association’s President Award for extraordinary service to the bar.
In 2002, the Missouri Bar selected Joseph Passanise as a Lon O. Hocker Trial Advocacy Award recipient. He was also chosen in 2009 to receive the President’s Award in recognition of his efforts with the Non-Partisan Court Plan effort in Greene County.
National Academy of Criminal Defense Attorneys
Taylon Sumners has been recognized by the National Academy of Criminal Defense Attorneys as a 2021 Top Criminal Attorney in the US. Taylon achieved a Top 10 ranking in the state of Missouri.
