Dorman Walker is a member of the Firm's litigation section and its Health Care and Employment practice groups. He is listed in Best Lawyers 2010 for Commercial Litigation, Health Care, and Labor and Employment. Mr. Walker also practices education and voting rights law. Mr. Walker represents clients in administrative proceedings before agencies that regulate health care, such as the Alabama Certificate of Need (CON) Board and the SHCC, and in contested cases and appeals to circuit court. He also advises health care clients on compliance with the many federal and state statutes and regulations that govern this area of the law.

Mr. Walker represents clients in matters involving federal employment laws, such as Title VII, the ADA, the ADEA, and collective actions under the FLSA, and in state court proceedings relating to trade secrets and non-compete and confidentiality agreements.

Mr. Walker represents colleges and universities, local boards of education, independent schools, and the Alabama Association of School Boards in matters as varied as anti-trust law, contracts, FERPA, faculty terminations, First Amendment rights, civil rights lawsuits and class actions, and compliance with open meetings and public records laws. Mr. Walker has represented the Alabama legislature’s permanent committee on reapportionment and many local governments in matters involving preclearance under Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act, redistricting, and lawsuits under Sections 2 and 5 of the Voting Rights Act and the equal protection clause. He has participated in numerous appeals to the United States Supreme Court, the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals (including oral arguments) and the Alabama Supreme Court and Alabama Court of Civil Appeals. 

Mr. Walker also represents clients before the Alabama Board of Adjustment.               

Mr. Walker is a former President of the Hugh Maddox Inn of Court and a former long-term Secretary-Treasurer of the Montgomery Federal Bar Association. He also has chaired the Bar's grievance committee for Montgomery County, which investigates and responds to complaints of unethical conduct by lawyers.

Mr. Walker is a graduate of Washington and Lee University and the University of Alabama School of Law, where he was Alabama Editor of The Alabama Law Review, president of the Bench and Bar Honorary Society, a Hugo Black Scholar and a member of the law school’s honor court.

He is Vice President of the Board of Directors of the Montgomery Academy, a K-12 independent school, and Chairman of the Board of the Cloverdale Playhouse, which will present its first season in early 2012 in its newly renovated playhouse. He is a member of  St. Peter's Catholic Church.

Mr. Walker is married to Susan Russ Walker, Chief Magistrate Judge of the Middle District of Alabama.

REPRESENTATIVE TRANSACTIONS

• United States Supreme Court

  • Sinkfield v. Kelley, 531 U.S. 28 (2000) (per curiam) (first impression, reversing a three-judge court’s ruling on standing relating to redistricting).

  Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals

  • Brown v. Ala. DOT, 597 F. 3d 1160 (11th Cir. 2010) (appeal only, overturning adverse jury determination on six of nine claims of race discrimination against a state agency).
  • Shortz v. Auburn University, 274 Fed. Appx. 859 (11th Cir. 2008) (affirming summary judgment in a race discrimination case).
  • Dillard v. Chilton County Comm’n, 495 F. 3d 1324 (11th Cir 2007) (voting rights, holding that intervenor voters lack standing to challenge consent decree establishing cumulative voting for county commission), cert. denied sub. nom Green v. Chilton County Comm’n, 2008 U.S. Lexis 5216 (2008).
  • Hollis v. Davis, 941 F. 2d 1471 (11th Cir. 1991) (on appointment by the Eleventh Circuit, obtaining habeas relief for illiterate black man sentenced to 99 years in 1959 for first degree burglary by an all-white jury in a county with a population that was 72 % black).

  U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Alabama

  • Stephens v. Board of Trustees of Auburn University, 2011 U.S. Dist Lexis (M.D. Ala 2011) (granting summary judgment against gender discrimination claim).
  • Fruit of the Loom, Inc. v. Bishop, 2011 U.S Dist. Lexis 5963 (M.D. Ala 2011) (denying a preliminary injunction to prevent client from working for a company that competes with Fruit of the Loom).
  • Oji v. Auburn University, 2010 U.S. Dist. Lexis 61770 (M.D. Ala. 2010) (granting motion to dismiss alleged violations of due process and equal protection clause).
  • United States v. Alabama, 2006 U.S. Dist. Lexis 55154 (M.D. Ala. 2006) (representing amicus judge of probate for the purpose of shaping relief granted  in an action by the Department of Justice against the State of Alabama for violations of the Help America Vote Act of 2002).
  • Drakeford v. Ala. Coop. Extension Sys., 416 F. Supp. 2d 1286 (M.D. Ala. 2006), adhered to on reconsideration, 425 F. Supp. 2d 1274 (granting summary judgment against multiple claims of race discrimination).
  • Rayborn v. Auburn University, 350 F. Supp 954 (M.D. Ala. 2004) (granting summary judgment against claims of race discrimination).
  • Strain v. Muse,  940 F. Supp. 302 (M.D. Ala. 1996) (terminating consent decree and federal court oversight of a state educational entity after 26 years).
  • Blount v. Ala. Coop. Extension Serv., 869 F. Supp. 1543 (M.D. Ala. 1994) (granting summary judgment against claims of race and gender discrimination).

  Alabama Supreme Court

  • Ex parte Wilson, 984 So. 2d 1161 (Ala. 2008) (first impression, obtaining a favorable interpretation of the Alabama Teacher Tenure Act).
  • Auburn Univ. v. Advertiser Co., 867 So. 2d 293 (Ala. 2003) (first impression, establishing that under Alabama’s sunshine law, university board could meet in executive session regarding honorariums and that the attorney-client privilege applied to litigation discussions).

  Alabama Circuit Court (trial-level court)

  • Chloe Compton v. Compass Group,  case no. CV-2010-902891 (Cir. Court of Jefferson Co. 2011)
  • FSQC-AL v. Noland Health Services, Inc., case no. CV-2009-900859 (Cir. Court of Montgomery Co. 2009) (first impression, establishing that state CON Review Board lacked subject matter jurisdiction over CON applications which on their face could not be compliant with the State Health Plan).

PROFESSIONAL ACTIVITIES

• Alabama Council of School Board Attorneys, former President
• Alabama State Bar
• American Bar Association
• American Inns of Court, Hugh Maddox Inn, President 2005-06
• Federal Bar Association, former Secretary & Treasurer
• Montgomery County Bar Association

NEWS

PUBLICATIONS

Speaking Engagements