Rowland also notes that, although he never talks about it, Wade “saw some pretty serious combat” while serving in Vietnam and “it translates over into how he approaches litigation,” Rowland says.

Wade's practice consists primarily of complex litigation and trial of personal injury, premises liability, construction defect, insurance, mobile home residency and intellectual property matters. With regard to insurance, Wade handles “large exposure cases, whether they be personal injury, products liability, bad faith or contractual,” he says.

Wade feels particularly comfortable handling insurance cases because, he says, “I am by nature a conservative person, and the business of insurance is a conservative business, so we are a good match.”

“Also, in some sense, it is being inquisitive. With a Sherlock Holmes bent, a good insurance defense lawyer performs his or her job. The nature of this field is to seek answers to questions: How did an event occur? What was the cause of the event? And, in a personal injury action, how was someone damaged and were there any other contributing causes? And I am one who questions a lot, and so, again, it’s a natural chemistry,” he says.

Wade spends a great deal of time in the courtroom, trying “as few as one and as many as four or five trials per year.”

“I can't think of anything I’d rather do,“ he says.

Wade prepares for trial in ways that he believes will engage jurors and deservedly earn their confidence.

“Jurors are always looking to feel comfortable trusting what a trial lawyer tells them to be true, and preparation carries the day,” he says.

Accordingly, Wade tries to “create an environment that allows the jurors to share the trial experience with you as opposed to separate from you.”

To that end, he always uses demonstrative evidence. In complex cases, he has found the ELMO projector to be a “superb tool . . . to encourage the jury to understand not only what the evidence is, but to understand the effect of each piece of evidence,” he says.

Ultimately, Wade’s enthusiasm for trial law stems not only from his fascination with the process and with juries but also from the pleasure he derives from working with his colleagues.

“I have the good fortune of having very good supporting partners. We balance each other out in terms of our relative skills.

It’s a good combination that has worked not only for ourselves but for our clients,” he says.

Wade feels as strongly about the attorneys whom he has opposed in court.

“My adversaries have been very ethical, professional lawyers, and that’s always a pleasure to have on the other side,” he says.

Nor is Wade’s respect for his adversaries unmatched. Al Hodges, who opposed Wade in the Dunham case, says Wade “was quite good.”

“He has what I would characterize as a harsh personal approach that seemed to work very well for him in this case,” Hodges says.

Karen G. Gruneisen, an attorney with the San Francisco law firm of Lerner & Veit, which represents both plaintiffs and defendants in personal injury, employment, construction defect, business and estate planning matters, opposed Wade in the five-week trial of a brain-injury case which Gruneisen represented the plaintiff.

“We waited a week for a jury verdict, so we had a lot of time in an empty courtroom together, and he was a good storyteller,” she says.

Outside the presence of a jury, Gruneisen says, Wade is “professionally courteous,” “soft-spoken” and “personally engaging.”

Before the jury, Wade was “a very strong advocate . . . In cross-examination, he was very aggressive . . . I think his style was attractive to the jurors in our case,” Gruneisen says.

“He is an attorney who is true to his word, meaning that, if he tells you he is going to do something, he does it,” she says.

Despite his busy trial schedule, Wade participates in community work both through the firm and at home. The firm provides pro bono services to the Interval House Crisis Shelters and Centers for Victims of Domestic Violence, which works with battered women and their children.

According to Janine Limas, community education director, the firm participates in fund-raisers and handles client credit, housing and family law needs. The law firm recently helped a former Interval House client with the expenses surrounding her son’s death.

On the home front, Wade volunteers for his homeowner’s association and spends time with his family, including six children, ages 12 to 35, and two grandchildren, all of whom live in Southern California. Wade also serves as regional commissioner of the AYSO soccer program for Newport Beach and Corona del Mar.

“We have over 1,740 children that we provide soccer opportunities to [in] East Newport Beach and Corona del Mar,” he says. “That’s approximately 175 teams. I get to kind of oversee all of the things on a year-round basis that affect the soccer community.”

“I am blessed to have a spouse and children who support my reaching out like that. You can't do it by yourself,” Wade says.