Karl Numinen

MARQUETTE — A recent Leading Lawyers survey featured 10 of the top criminal defense lawyers based upon a survey of their peers.

One of those lawyers is Marquette-based criminal defense lawyer Karl Numinen.

He said being the only U.P. criminal defense lawyer listed on the Leading lawyers survey was “very rewarding.”

“I’m really proud to be part of this group,” Numinen said. “The attorney immediately across from me on that sheet, Tom (Thomas) Cranmer, is a former United States attorney, a partner in the largest law firm in the state and the former president of the Michigan Bar Association (State Bar of Michigan). So it feels really rewarding to be included in such an esteemed company of my colleagues.”

Numinen, of Numinen Deforge & Toutant PC in Marquette, has been practicing law for 31 years. Before law school, he worked in politics for a United States senator.

“I realized that all the decision makers on his staff were either PhDs or lawyers,” Numinen said. “And I decided that if I wanted to pursue a career in politics, I should probably get a law degree.”

Numinen first started with a bachelor’s degree in social work, which got him involved in politics in the office of the senator.

“I then decided to go to law school and during law school, I worked as an aide, a special assistant to (former) Michigan governor Jim (James) Blanchard. I worked full-time and went to school at night,” he said. “But then things took a sudden turn when Jim Blanchard lost the election and we were all out of jobs. So then I decided, instead of politics, I would become a trial lawyer.”

The biggest change in his career was leaving a law firm of 150 lawyers to forming his own partnership with friends to create a small boutique litigation firm in Grand Rapids. He’s been the owner of his own law firm for the last 25 years.

“I worked for some really top notch law firms, couple of the largest law firms in the state of Michigan, and (I) really enjoyed that but I decided that I have a more entrepreneurial spirit,” Numinen said.

He also has over 20 years of experience with tribal law. He first sought admission to the tribal court of the Sault Saint Marie Tribe of Chippewa Indians.

“They approved me and I became licensed to practice before the Chippewa tribe in Sault Saint Marie. I have subsequently added the Keweenaw Bay Indian Community. I’m a member of their bar as well.”

The KBIC tribal court recently appointed Numinen as the independent hearings officer, otherwise known as an appeal officer.

“So if somebody as a member of the community is terminated from their employment, for example, they have a right to appeal that decision, that termination decision. The KBIC tribal court has appointed me to hear those disputes,” he said. “So I preside, essentially, as judge and jury over those types of grievance appeals which is a pretty fascinating process and I’m really honored that they selected me to be their independent hearing officer.”

Throughout his career, Numinen said he is currently most proud of being named a Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers, an honor reserved for the top 1% of lawyers in the nation.

“It is an aspiration that lots and lots of lawyers have but very few ever get,” he said.

The ACTL is an invitation-only national organization dedicated to the “promotion of excellence in the practice of law” and only invited attorneys who have the highest standards of practice and “sterling reputations for ethics and civility,” according to Numinen.

In Michigan, for example, there are around 40,000 lawyers but there are less than 200 members of the ACTL.

The screening process, as Numinen said, is “incredibly difficult” to get through. He was nominated by a lawyer in Grand Rapids.

“The screening committee will then interview every single judge that I’ve had a trial before in the last twenty years,” Numinen said. “Every single opposing counsel, so every lawyer I’ve gone up against in a trial in the last twenty years, has been interviewed. Every law partner, all the local judges, whether I’ve had a trial with them or not, and anybody else that they decide.”

He said if anybody gives a nominee a bad review, has a question about their ethics or civility to opposing counsel or the court or their skill in the courtroom, then that nominee does not make it through the process.

“It was an incredible honor for me to even get nominated,” he said. “And then when I found out that I was nominated and found out I was selected for fellowship, I would say that’s the proudest accomplishment of my career.”

The Leading Lawyers survey can be found at issuu.com/grmag/docs/michigan_blue_fall_2023_digimag on pages 14 and 15.

More information on Numinen’s law career can be found at numinenlaw.com/attorney/karl-p-numinen.

Dreyma Beronja can be reached at 906-228-2500 ext. 548. Their email address is dberonj@miningjournal.net.