ABOUT THE FIRM
Ben Reyes — trial counsel,
by training and by choice.
ABOUT BEN
career highlights
Gerry Spence
Method Graduate
(formerly Trial Lawyers College
SUPER LAWYER RECOGNITION
Million Dollar Advocates Forum
Top 40 Under 40 trial lawyer
ACCOLADES & AFFILIATIONS
Wisconsin Super Lawyer
2024 - 2026
WISCONSIN RISING STAR
2018 - 2023
Million Dollar Advocates Forum
Lifetime Member
National Trial Lawyers Top 40 under 40
Wisconsin - 2020
Gerry Spence Method
(formerly Trial Lawyers College) 2022
American Association for Justice
Nursing Home Litigation Group
Academy of Truck Accident Attorneys
Member
New Mexico Trial Lawyers Association
Member
Texas Trial Lawyers Association
Member
Wisconsin Association for Justice
Member
Southern New Mexico Bar Association
Member
quick
facts
♦ 15 years of trial practice
♦ Licensed in WI · NM · TX · IL
♦ Bilingual: English & Spanish
♦ Marquette Law, cum laude, Top 10%
♦ Gerry Spence Method Graduate
♦ Million Dollar Advocates Forum — Lifetime Member
DEDICATED TO JUSTICE
ABOUT BEN
Where I come froM
I’m a second-generation Mexican-American. My maternal family has more than a hundred years of roots in the Borderland, starting in El Paso’s Segundo Barrio. My grandfather grew up there, raised by his mother — a public school cafeteria worker supporting three children alone. His brother lied about his age to enlist in the Army, went Missing in Action at the Chosin Reservoir in December 1950, and never came home.
My paternal grandfather was born in West Texas, picked fruit and shined shoes as a kid to get by. He then served with the Marine Corps in Korea and spent thirty years on the line at a Midwestern auto plant. Through hard work and dedication to his family, he was able to provide a better life for all three of his children. This is where I learned my core values: hard work, devotion to family, and a purpose larger than yourself. It is also why I do the work I do. When I sit across from someone’s grandmother in a nursing home case, I am thinking about my own grandparents — and the dignity I would want for them.
That heritage, sharpened by his Jesuit education, settled Ben's single conviction about what a lawyer is supposed to be: a person for others.
Defense, then plaintiff.
For 8 years prior to starting his own law firm, Ben fought on the plaintiff’s side, suing some of the largest healthcare providers in the country on behalf of injured residents and their families. Those years taught him the inner workings of how nursing homes actually function — how staffing and budget decisions get made at the corporate level, where the records live, and what to look for to establish the patterns and reckless conduct that operators work hard to keep hidden. That is the work that uncovers the truth and answers the question every family brings through the door: why was my loved one hurt?
He came to that fight with an advantage. Ben spent the first chapter of his career on the defense side — catastrophic injury, product liability, and personal injury work for insurance carriers and corporate defendants — trying cases, taking depositions, and mastering the law from the inside, with four published Wisconsin Court of Appeals decisions along the way. He learned how the other side evaluates a case, which arguments they reach for, and where their playbooks have gaps. He uses that knowledge now to preempt the defense before they make their move — building every case from day one so that by the time it reaches a jury, the truth has nowhere to hide.
In 2018 he switched sides because plaintiff work aligns with his heart. He represents the people he sees in his own family, and what he brings them is simple: the tenacity and work ethic to go the distance, and the skills and experience to get the best results.
What Reyes Trial Law is for
Cases like these are won in the trenches — not in the closing argument, but in the months and years before. In the persistence to go after the records the facility doesn’t want to produce. In subpoenaing the staffing data and the corporate-parent communications the defendants would rather keep quiet. In reading every page of every chart until the pattern shows up. What happened to your loved one was not an accident. It was a systemic failure — by an operator, by a chain of ownership, by a structure built to make accountability hard. Proving that takes attention to detail and the willingness to keep pushing when the other side is hoping you will quit.
Fifteen years in the trenches taught me how that work gets done.
get to know reyes trial law
About the firm
How these cases get won
The firm is built around dignidad — the Spanish word for dignity, and the through-line for everything it does. The dignity of an elder who can no longer speak for herself. The dignity of a family that deserves a real lawyer. The dignity of being told the truth about your case from the very first phone call.
Selected Achievements
A record built on trial preparation
❖ Member of the trial and appellate team that won an $11 million verdict in a New Mexico nursing home negligence case — and affirmed the decision on appeal (prior firm representation)
❖ Wisconsin Super Lawyer — 2024, 2025, 2026
❖ Wisconsin Rising Star — 2018 – 2023
❖ Million Dollar Advocates Forum — Lifetime Member (2023)
❖ National Trial Lawyers Top 40 Under 40 — Wisconsin (2020)
❖ Gerry Spence Method (formerly Trial Lawyers College) — Thunderhead Ranch (2022)
❖ United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit Intern for Counsel to the Circuit Executive
❖ Marquette University Law School — J.D., cum laude, Top 10% (2011); CALI Award (Advanced Trial Advocacy); CALI Award (Comparative Transitional Justice); Thomas More Law Scholarship
❖ Legal Intern — U.S. Attorney’s Office, Eastern District of Wisconsin (Milwaukee)
❖ Judicial Intern — Hon. Aaron E. Goodstein, U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin
❖ Four published Wisconsin Court of Appeals decisions (defense side, prior practice)
❖ Licensed to practice law in Wisconsin, New Mexico, Texas, and Illinois — plus the U.S. District Courts for E.D. Wis., W.D. Wis., N.D. Ill., and D. N.M., and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit
❖ Admitted to practice in the U.S. District Courts for Eastern and Western Wisconsin, the Northern District of Illinois, the U.S. District Court for New Mexico, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit
❖ U.S. District Court for the Eastern and Western Districts of Wisconsin; Northern District of Illinois, U.S. District Court for New Mexico, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit
❖ Publications:
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Making a Millionaire? The Civil Implications for Overturning the Brendan Dassey Conviction, Wisconsin Civil Trial Journal, November 2017"
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Seventh Circuit Invokes Spokeo to Dismiss Wisconsin "No Injury Class Action, Milwaukee Bar Association Messenger, February 2017
education
Education, recognition, training
degrees & honors
J.D., Marquette University Law School (2011) — cum laude, Top 10%
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CALI Award (highest grade), Advanced Trial Advocacy
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CALI Award (highest grade), Comparative Transitional Justice
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Marquette Intellectual Property Law Review
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Alpha Sigma Nu — Jesuit Honor Society
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Public Interest Law Society Fellow
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Thomas More Law Scholarship
B.A., American Political Economy, The Colorado College (2005)
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DIGNITY
DIGNIDAD
The Spanish word carries weight the English one has lost. It is the standard the firm prepares to — for the injured person, for the family, and for the room the case will eventually be tried in.