Peter Chase Neumann — Scenic Nevada Heroe

Peter Chase Neumann has been a trial lawyer since 1965. He tried dozens of criminal jury trials in his early career in Tucson, Arizona, where he was appointed as defense counsel on many felony cases, before joining the office of the Pima County District Attorney, where he tried dozens of cases for the prosecution.

Moving to Reno, Nevada in 1968, Mr. Neumann distinguished himself as a trial lawyer in civil actions, always as counsel for plaintiff. He was one of the first Nevada lawyers to win a multimillion dollar damage verdict for his client, in the early 1970's. Since then, Peter has obtained numerous such verdicts for his clients, in a variety of tort cases including air crashes, defective consumer product failure cases, and insurance bad faith cases. One of his clients was awarded a six million dollar punitive damage verdict in a bad faith insurance case, which was affirmed on appeal in the decision of Ainsworth v. Combined Ins. Co. Of America, 104 Nev. 587, 763 P.2d 673. This remains the highest punitive damage award ever approved by the Nevada Supreme Court.

Peter became known throughout the nation in the 1980's as a pioneer in the field of utility vehicle rollover cases, such as the “Jeep CJ” vehicle. He founded the ATLA Jeep Litigation Group, for the sole purpose of assisting other lawyers in the United States with their own “Jeep Rollover” cases. Ultimately this group included more than 1,000 lawyers who received assistance from him with their clients’ litigation against Jeep Corporation. One of Mr. Neumann’s own clients, Patrick Owen Murray, won his product liability case against Jeep Corporation in a Reno courtroom. Jeep Corporation appealed the verdict but the Nevada Supreme Court affirmed, in a holding that judicially recognized that the Jeep CJ vehicle was defective and unreasonably dangerous. Three days after the Nevada Supreme Court’s decision was handed down in Jeep Corporation v. Murray, 101 Nev. 640, 708 P.2d 297, Jeep Corporation and its parent, Chrysler, announced their decision to cease manufacturing the Jeep CJ vehicle. This marked the end of a 40-year production line of vehicles that were highly prone to roll over and cause death or spinal cord injury to hundreds of occupants of the infamous “Jeeps.”

Mr. Neumann is a past president of Nevada Trial Lawyers Association (NTLA) and of the Reno Chapter of American Bd. Of Trial Advocates (ABOTA), in which he was conferred the rank of “Diplomate” which requires more than 100 completed jury trials. He has taught at law school and trial lawyer seminars, and the National Judicial College in Reno. He was appointed by President Clinton to serve on the Tahoe Regional Planning Agency for a term of four years. He serves on the board of Scenic Nevada and supports Angel Kiss Foundation, which assists local families whose children have cancer.

Mr. Neumann lives with his wife, Renate, in Reno, Nevada. His hobbies include flying powered aerobatic aircraft and gliders, as well as hunting, fishing, and skiing.

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