The 2025 Hall of Fame Inductees

Lisa E. Circeo, Circeo Law Firm, Lexington
Circeo is unusual in that she doesn’t try a lot of cases (just four since 1998 in Kentucky), but she is characterized by being involved when the stakes are high and punitive damages are involved. She has three million-dollar plus verdicts. The first was a $42.25 million nursing home case in 2010 from Hopkins County (Case No. 4392). The verdict included $40,000,000 in punitives. Again in 2016 in a nursing home case in Elizabethtown (Case No. 5539), the verdict was $1.18 million and the punitives were $1,000,000.

Teaming up in 2023 with Thomas Herren, they tried and lost a large exposure (Case No. 6093) where a worker electrocuted in a Kentucky Utilities construction accident. Circeo returned in 2024 with a $21,942,146 personal care home verdict in Greenup (Case No. 6220) that included $16.6 million in punitives. She has a top tier expertise in nursing home cases, and especially in advocating for punitive damages. A smart young lawyer (or an older one) would be well-advised to pull the tapes on a Circeo closing argument. What she says and does is working.