Thomas S Worthington | Attorney

In his 37 years of criminal trial practice, Mr. Worthington has successfully represented thousands of people in the State and Federal courts throughout California and several other states, including Georgia, Arizona and Washington. He has been the chief trial lawyer in over 100 jury trials from simple misdemeanor DUI to capital murder almost all of which have resulted in acquittals or reduction to lesser offenses. He has argued cases before several districts of the California Court of Appeal and the United States Circuit Court, 9th Circuit.

Mr. Worthington has been Certified as a Specialist in Criminal Law by the State Bar of California Board of Legal Specialization since 1977. In California there are only 355 attorneys with this distinction. He has been elected by his peers for the past 21 years as one of The Best Lawyers in America in the areas of Non-White-Collar Criminal Defense and White-Collar Criminal Defense. Mr. Worthington was chosen by his peers and identified in Northern California Super Lawyers, 2006 edition.

Mr. Worthington graduated in 1969 from University of California Hastings College of Law--California's first law school--having previously graduated in 1966 from University of California Los Angeles with a degree in Economics. He was admitted to the California State Bar in January, 1970. He began his career in Monterey County that same year as a sole practitioner and has remained one of the top criminal defense lawyers in Monterey County since.

Mr. Worthington has had a long and distinguished legal career. He has been the attorney of record in many of the most controversial, complex and difficult cases to arise in Central California over the past four decades. He has had cases published by the California Court of Appeal and the United States Circuit Court, 9th Circuit; he has written articles published in the American Journal of Clinical and Experimental Psychiatry on the use and admissibility in evidence of hypnotically induced testimony and has participated in the preparation of Amicus briefs for California Attorneys for Criminal Justice and he is a frequent T.V. commentator.

As a young attorney in 1974, Mr. Worthington joined as a charter member a then new organization known as California Attorneys for Criminal Justice. CACJ is a statewide organization of criminal defense lawyers dedicated to defending the rights of persons as guaranteed by both the United States Constitution and the Constitution of the State of California. Since 1974, he has served terms on the Board of Directors totaling over 20 years and has sat on committees including Amicus, Legislative and Prisons. He is currently a member on the Board.

In addition to his career as a trial attorney, Mr. Worthington was appointed as a Commissioner on the City of Salinas Traffic Commission. He kept this appointment until 1997 when he moved his residence from the City of Salinas to the County of Monterey mandating he resign his commission. He taught economics at Hartnell College from 1971 to1979, teaching many of the returning Viet Nam veterans seeking an education under their veteran's benefits. Mr. Worthington is a guest lecturer at a trial practice class taught by Judge Steven Sillman and Deputy District Attorney Chuck Olvis at the Monterey College of Law.

Mr. Worthington has lived in Salinas for the past 37 years where he and his wife raised three children.