Built to find what others miss.
Porter | Smith Law is my private practice, serving founders, privately held businesses, families, and individuals in Missouri and Kentucky.
The docket is limited by design. Taking on fewer matters allows each one the attention it requires, and allows me to understand a client’s business well enough to anticipate what is coming rather than respond to it after the fact.
What the practice covers.
Business and transactions
The transactional work covers contract drafting and negotiation, entity formation, and the operating and partnership agreements that govern how owners deal with one another. When a business changes hands, whether by outright sale or internal buyout, I structure the transaction and carry it through closing. Multi-state matters are part of the practice, including real estate and state and local tax considerations.
Commercial and civil disputes
When a contract fails or a disagreement among owners escalates, I represent you. The work includes collection actions, ownership and control disputes, and litigation over business interests and real property.
Privacy and data
The privacy practice addresses what you collect, what you are obligated to disclose, and what your analytics and AI vendors do with the data you send them. It also addresses whether the data you already hold can be developed into a revenue stream of its own.
Technology and intellectual property
Many businesses hold data, processes, or software worth considerably more than their books reflect. I develop that material into revenue-generating products or protectable intellectual property, directing engineering teams in the United States and abroad, and I resolve the ownership, licensing, and protection questions that follow.
A deliberately limited practice.
Fewer matters mean sustained attention rather than periodic triage. Where a matter calls for expertise outside the practice, I retain the appropriate attorney, accountant, or technical specialist and define the scope of that engagement in advance.
Diagnosis before recommendation
Every engagement begins by establishing the facts and the circumstances surrounding them. That work distinguishes the presenting problem from its underlying cause, and it frequently changes the recommendation.
Direct access to counsel
Correspondence, analysis, and strategic decisions come from me. There is no intake layer and no delegation of substantive work.
Analytical infrastructure
Structured research and purpose-built software organize the record, test assumptions, and maintain consistency across a matter. They inform the analysis; they do not substitute for it.
Scope and fees
Scope, responsibilities, and fee structure are established in writing before work begins. Depending on the matter, engagements proceed on an hourly, fixed-fee, or phased basis.
Confidentiality and information security
Information security is treated as part of the representation. Technology and outside support are selected according to the sensitivity of the matter and the confidentiality obligations that attach to it.
My work covers business and transactional matters, commercial and civil disputes, privacy and data, and the custom technology built for clients.
Most matters implicate more than one of those at once. A dispute implicates governance. A data practice implicates compliance and valuation. A transaction depends as much on the relationships behind it as on the documents that record it.
Before opening the firm, I spent more than three years consulting independently on artificial intelligence and business strategy, and worked inside and alongside law firms, banks, wealth management firms, and marketing firms.
That range is why a contract, a dispute, a data question, and a new entity can be handled in one place.
Request an introduction
New matters are accepted selectively, and most arrive through referrals from other attorneys, advisers, and existing clients. An initial message should describe the issue, identify the parties involved, note any pending deadline, and indicate how you learned of the practice.