John-Russell Bart Pate

Attorney Russell Pate earned his law degree from the University of North Carolina School of Law.  He then went on to earn a masters-of-law from California Western School of Law in San Diego in the area of trial advocacy.  Attorney Pate started his legal career working for a large plaintiff's law firm helping people around the world who had developed cancer from exposure to asbestos, benezene and other toxic substances.  Next, he worked with the Federal Public Defender's Office in Texas practicing criminal defense in the federal courts of the United States.  Before opening his own law firm he worked for an insurance defense firm on St. Thomas.  He has passed the bar in three States and two Territories: North Carolina, Texas, Florida, the U.S. Virgin Islands and the District Court of Puerto Rico. He practices in the U.S. Virgin Islands, focusing on cancers and diseases from asbestos, bauxite, benezene and cigarette smoke.  He holds the records for highest trial verdict in the USVI: $83 million for a tobacco/cigarette fraud case.