PHOTO BY PETER ACKER
SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION
MAKING A DIFFERENCE important thing is life is helping others. “It is the most selfless and selfish act there is,” says Yerrid. “I believe anyone deserves a chance at a good life, and helping others is tremendously gratifying.” It is a maxim that has shaped Yerrid’s life professionally and personally, inspiring him to ensure that others experience the help and opportunities he did, which allowed him to become one of the nation̛ s best trial lawyers. In June 1971, before returning to the Virgin Islands where he did summer construction work, Katharine Graham, then owner and publisher of The Washington Post and a friend of Yerrid’s father, who worked there for many years, made it her mission to further Yerrid’s education. “I knew her since I was a very young man. On one of my visits to her office, she called the dean at Georgetown Law University Center who had once been the Post’s general counsel, and convinced him to interview me,” says Yerrid. “We hit it off, and I was admitted ʻon probation,̛ because my Louisiana State University background was less than stellar. That great law shcool gave me a chance, and Mrs. Graham was the reason.” “Frankly, I have never succeeded without the help of others,” says Yerrid. “And whenever I have failed, I have failed all by myself. I think helping others is essential for a good and meaningful life.”
How One Attorney Makes Good on the Golden Rule
W
hen Steve Yerrid found success—real, big success—one of the first things he did was buy his mother a car. An Oldsmobile, to be exact. “My mother got to see me succeed more than she had ever imagined,” says Yerrid, a nationally renowned and highly respected trial attorney from Tampa Bay and founder of the prestigious Yerrid Law Firm. “I paid off her house and bought her a car, but when it was delivered she didn’t like the color. She finally settled on the third one I had them bring. She wanted an American car that was pretty.” Yerrid’s mother, Faye, divorced from his father when he was only seven years old. “My mother raised me, and sometimes she had a hard time putting food on the table, putting clothes on my back, but she never failed me,” says Yerrid. “She denied herself things and instead gave them to me.” Yerrid learned how to play baseball by throwing at his mother’s mitt. She rarely saw any child support. He had a paper route, and he took a job edging sidewalks at their apartment building to help out. Always forgiving toward his family, Yerrid notes that through a tumultuous relationship between Faye and his father, Charlie—a sometimes-abusive former boxer and WWII vet—his parents taught him his most valued lesson: That the most 18 | F L O R I D A
Before he had the trappings of success, Yerrid used what he had to fulfill that goal. “I didn’t have much money, but I did have time,” says Yerrid. “And that is the most precious commodity we can give to others: our time coupled with love.” In the 70̛ s, Yerrid began working with his beloved cancer kids. On another occasion, he went about soliciting 125 steaks, numerous cases of Coca-Cola and “all the corn we could carry” for a Steak & Sports day benefitting local children who have been separated from their families, live within the state system, or have behavioral problems—an annual event that, 35 years later, the Hillsborough County Bar Association Young Lawyers Division still carries on. After Yerrid achieved greatness, he stepped up his giving to a new level. And he has indeed achieved greatness—at 30 years of age he successfully defended John Lerro, the pilot of the freighter MV Summit Venture, clearing him of wrongdoing when the ship crashed into the Sunshine Skyway Bridge in 1980, killing 35 and causing more than $100 million in damages. Other major successes include a $12 billion settlement in late Florida Governor Lawton Chiles’ case against the cigarette industry in 1997 in which Yerrid served as the youngest member of Florida’s “Dream Team;” a 2006 jury verdict of $217 million, the largest medical malpractice award in Florida’s history and the nation’s largest medical
I fight in the courtroom, not because I dislike the other people, but because I am on the right side, and for justice to prevail, we need to win. -STEVE YERRID
malpractice verdict; a $330 million award in 2009, the nation’s largest that year in a wrongful death suit; and earlier this year, he got a verdict of $64 million for an injured construction worker. In July, he obtained a $27.4 million BP payout for the City of Tampa following the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, the largest amount that any Florida city received. These successes, and many others, formed the base on which Yerrid was able to build a legacy as a philanthropist. “I call it reverse money laundering,” says Yerrid. “I take from the wrongdoers and use that money to further the