Nashville, TN – Respected Nashville attorney and founding partner of Trauger & Tuke, Byron Trauger, announces the joining of his practice with Wiseman Ashworth Law Group. The firm will rebrand as Wiseman Ashworth Trauger, effective March 1.

“Gail [Ashworth], Tom [Wiseman], and Byron are among Tennessee’s most creative, effective, and efficient lawyers,” said William “Bill” C. Koch, Jr. former Tennessee Supreme Court Justice and Dean of the Nashville School of Law. “Gail is a skilled litigator and mediator with a local, state, and national reputation. Tom is widely recognized as one of the state’s best healthcare liability lawyers. Byron’s strong healthcare regulatory practice and strategic problem-solving skills keep him in high demand in both the public and private sectors. Their synergy will result in high-quality legal services that will have a great impact on their clients’ needs.”

Trauger’s practice is concentrated in health care, complex civil litigation, general business matters, and regulatory agency work. He also has significant business experience, having chaired the board of a $500-million publicly-traded managed care company, and having served on the boards of directors of privately held health care and technology companies. A significant portion of Trauger’s practice involves advising health care entities on strategic issues and representing them before state regulatory agencies. He also represents other business entities in areas in which law and public policy or regulations intersect. Having been a federal prosecutor early in his career, Trauger is comfortable in the courtroom and frequently represents clients in complex business litigation.

He has chaired a Tennessee gubernatorial campaign and two Nashville mayoral campaigns. He led the negotiating team that brought the Tennessee Titans (then the Houston Oilers) to Nashville.

For nearly a decade, Trauger chaired the Board of Trustees of Martin Methodist College (now UT Southern) and now serves on the executive committee of the Nashville Public Education Foundation. He has also served on the boards of the PENCIL Foundation, Nashville Public Radio, You Have the Power, the Tennessee State Museum Foundation, Nashville Rotary Club, the Nashville Public Library Foundation, The Land Trust for Tennessee, Historic Nashville, Nashville Children’s Theatre, PEACE, and the Tennessee Repertory Theater. He is a Fellow of the American Bar Foundation, the Tennessee Bar Foundation, and the Nashville Bar Foundation and has chaired the Campaign for the Legal Aid Society of Middle Tennessee. He is an active Rotarian and United Methodist.

Trauger is a Rhodes Scholar who received his B.A. magna cum laude from Duke University and studied in Lima, Peru as a Rotary Foundation Undergraduate Scholar. He graduated from Yale Law School in 1977 where he was Associate Editor of the Yale Review of Law and Social Action. He began his legal career as a judicial clerk to the late Hon. Frank W. Wilson, United States District Judge for the Eastern District of Tennessee. He served as an Assistant United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Tennessee after which he practiced for two years with the Boston, Massachusetts firm of Bingham, Dana & Gould. In 1983 he returned to Tennessee to form the firm that became Trauger & Tuke.

Trauger’s longtime law partner, Bob Tuke, commented about his friend, “I am pleased Byron has joined Wiseman Ashworth. This has its own important significance. Wiseman Ashworth is a wonderful law firm; relatively small in terms of attorneys, but what they do for their clients is done extremely well. Tom and Gail value Byron and Byron values them.”

Tuke will finalize a few client projects and then begin enjoying retirement to spend more time with his family and friends. But even in retirement he will continue providing volunteer support to his choice nonprofits involved in veterans’ issues, land conservation and adoption laws.

“Tom and I are thrilled and honored that Byron is joining the firm as a named partner,” said Ashworth. “He has a depth of experience and an excellent reputation in the Bar, with his clients, and in the community as a highly respected counsellor, advocate and public servant. We could not be more pleased that he is joining us.”

Ashworth is a recent recipient of the American Bar Association Tort Trial and Insurance Practice Section’s Edmund S. Muskie Pro Bono Service Award for her commitment to access to justice and dedication to pro bono service. Ashworth, a Tennessee Rule 31 Listed General Civil Mediator and Family Mediator, has extensive experience at the civil and administrative trial and appellate levels as both defense and plaintiff’s counsel and a strong dispute resolution practice. She is past president of the Nashville and Tennessee Bar Associations, serves as a trustee of the Nashville Bar Foundation, and is an elected member of the ABA House of Delegates and the ABA/TIPS Council. She is a co-founder of national, state and local lawyer leadership programs and has served as a professor of trial techniques at the TIPS/ABOTA National Trial Academy. She is a past Chair of the Tennessee Supreme Court Access to Justice Commission and a founding member of the Tennessee Academy of Mediators and Arbitrators.

Wiseman has practiced law for 39 years, concentrating on medical and hospital malpractice litigation, civil litigation and professional liability. A Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers and the Tennessee and Nashville Bar Foundations, he has tried more than 100 jury trials to verdict in Tennessee State and Federal trial courts and in other states. He is AV®Preeminent™ rated – the highest peer-review rating possible. Committed to building professionalism in law, he has taught Trial Advocacy as an Adjunct Professor at Vanderbilt Law School for 15 years and is a past president of the Nashville Bar Association.

Wiseman Ashworth Trauger focuses on all areas of healthcare liability, including the defense of physicians, hospitals and long-term care facilities in all aspects of litigation in state, federal and administrative courts. The firm also handles healthcare regulation, personal injury and products liability cases, as well as insurance coverage, medical ethics, probate, commercial litigation and employment matters. Wiseman Ashworth Trauger was founded by partners Gail Vaughn Ashworth and Tom Wiseman in 2010. Margaret Moore, Kimberly G. Silvus, Michele T. Marsicano, Anthony C. Bills and Bradley M. Dowd are also partners in the firm. For more information, visit www.wisemanashworth.com. The new website link will be available soon.