Spencer J. Pahlke

Spencer’s practice focuses on catastrophic personal injury and wrongful death cases involving defective products, vehicular collisions, dangerous conditions of public and private property, and medical malpractice.

Outside of his practice at Walkup, he also teaches at the University of California-Berkeley Law School as a lecturer in trial advocacy.

In addition to his teaching, he directs Berkeley Law’s external trial competition program and coaches multiple trial advocacy teams. Under Spencer’s guidance, the program has risen to national prominence, having won many national honors and distinctions, including several national championships. Spencer serves as the Regional Representative for Northern California, Nevada, Arizona, and Hawaii in the National Association of Legal Advocacy Educators.

Spencer is a co-author of Introduction to Trial Advocacy: The Elements of Trial, a pioneering all-online video lecture series that teaches aspiring trial attorneys at all levels the fundamentals of trying a case. Introduction to Trial Advocacy has been published through Trial Guides, a renowned legal publishing house, and is designed for both self-study trial advocacy learning and use in a trial advocacy course.

Spencer is also a recipient of the Edward D. Ohlbaum Professionalism Award, an award designed to recognize a trial advocacy teacher and program director who exemplifies the late Professor Ohlbaum’s commitment. professionalism, integrity, and honed proficiency. The award honors an individual whose life and practice display sterling character and unquestioned integrity.

Spencer has taught and lectured on trial advocacy and tort law at institutions including the University of Michigan School of Law, Universidad de Monterrey (Mexico), San Francisco State University, and UC Berkeley. Spencer has also been an invited lecturer at Baylor University’s prestigious School of the Trial, hosted annually in St. Andrews, Scotland. Spencer’s teaching includes instruction at the Public Defender’s Offices of San Francisco and Sacramento Counties.

Spencer provides ongoing legal education, including developing and co-chairing programs produced in conjunction with Berkeley Law, with a special focus on providing training to young attorneys. He has also co-chaired a presentation on governmental liability and design immunity, spoken to leading trial associations regarding governmental liability, made presentations on liability for commercial carriers, and lectured on the topic of liability insurance in the context of products liability.

Spencer was selected as a Super Lawyer from 2013-2020, and before that a Rising Star in 2011 and 2012. In 2014-2020, he was listed by Best Lawyers. Also. in 2020 Spencer was recognized by The Daily Journal’s “Top 40 Under 40” attorneys in California.

After graduating with Highest Distinction from the University of Nebraska with a double major in Economics and Psychology, Spencer attended law school at Berkeley Law, receiving his J.D. in 2007. At Berkeley, Spencer was a member of the California Law Review as well as an associate editor for Ecology Law Quarterly. Academically, he won Prosser Awards in Legal Ethics and in Environmental Law.

Spencer’s main interest in law school was trial advocacy, both in Berkeley Law’s competitive trial advocacy program and its clinical programs. Clinically, he tried cases before Oakland’s Citizens’ Police Review Board. There, his responsibilities included representing people claiming violations of their constitutional rights at the hands of the Oakland Police Department. He successfully competed on several trial teams. He won the Bay Area trial competition held by the San Francisco Trial Lawyers Association. Additionally, in the National Trial Competition, his three-person team was a regional finalist, and he won two top advocate awards.

Spencer joined the Walkup firm in 2007, and practices all types of personal injury litigation in all courts within the State of California.