After more than a decade of training lawyers in the art of persuading jurors that tortfeasors’ actions are more than isolated incidents, and instead reflect systemic failures that pose a threat to the public at large, attorney Don Keenan—co-progenitor of the “Reptile theory” of plaintiff’s advocacy—shrugs aside accusations that his techniques are unscrupulous and trample the rules of evidence.

But the principal of Atlanta’s Keenan Law Firm cheerfully agrees with defense lawyers that his techniques have helped spur the wave of “nuclear verdicts” that began several years ago.