Jay Harvey

Jay Harvey co-founded Winckler, Harvey & McConnell, LLP, and among Austin injury lawyers his name carries a particular kind of weight: respect earned from colleagues and adversaries alike. Harvey has devoted his career to people harmed by negligence and medical malpractice, and his philosophy is straightforward — his clients want a system that answers to the patient, not just a settlement check, and relentless, thorough preparation is what wins against difficult odds.

He is Board Certified as a trial specialist in Personal Injury Trial Law by the Texas Board of Legal Specialization, a certification reserved for only the most experienced trial lawyers. What separates Harvey from other certified specialists is his role in shaping the legal landscape itself. He is a past president of the Texas Trial Lawyers Association and remains active in the organization, having previously served as its legislative chair and led its medical malpractice task force. He was president of the Capital Area Trial Lawyers Association from 2003 to 2004, sat on the State Bar of Texas Pattern Jury Charge Committee from 2001 to 2004, and has been a member of the American Board of Trial Advocates since 1998. For decades he has pushed to improve the laws affecting Texas patients and workers — advocacy that earned him the 2023 Champion of Justice award from Texas Watch, a non-partisan citizen group focused on holding insurance companies and corporations accountable to their customers.

The peer recognition is extensive. Best Lawyers named him Austin’s Lawyer of the Year for Medical Malpractice Law – Plaintiffs in 2018, 2020, and 2022, and for Personal Injury Litigation – Plaintiffs in 2015 and 2017. He has repeatedly made the Super Lawyers Top 50 for the Central and West Texas region — including 2008, 2011, 2013 through 2016, and 2018 through 2020 — and reached the Texas Super Lawyers Top 100 in 2016. One of his cases, Mary Ann Summers v. Standard Regional Home Health, Inc., was named among VerdictSearch’s Top Texas Verdicts of 2011.

Harvey earned his B.S. cum laude from West Texas State University in 1979 and his J.D. from Texas Tech University School of Law in 1982. Away from the practice, he is an avid golfer and biker who loves traveling, working his ranch, and spending time with his wife, adult daughter, and two dogs.

Harvey is the right call for patients and families dealing with the aftermath of medical negligence — and for anyone catastrophically injured who needs genuine trial credentials rather than a negotiator hoping the case settles. His decades of leadership in the plaintiff’s bar mean defense lawyers and insurers know exactly who they are up against. Consultations are free, and fees are contingent on a recovery.