North End resident and Boston attorney Douglas K. Sheff has been elected president of the Massachusetts Bar Association for its 2013-14 year, beginning on Sept. 1. The MBA is the preeminent voice of the legal profession in Massachusetts, and Sheff is the first attorney in Massachusetts to serve as president of the MBA and the Massachusetts Academy of Trial Attorneys (MATA), and as governor of the American Association of Justice (AAJ) and trustee of the AAJ’s National College of Advocacy.
A passionate advocate for using the civil justice system to effectuate positive change, Sheff will focus his presidency on three initiatives: the “Working Families Initiative,” “Consumer Law Initiative,” and “Justice for all Initiative.” Through these initiatives and other MBA programs, Sheff is committed to protecting working families and consumers, and promoting the public image of lawyers as an honorable profession.
Senior partner at Sheff Law in Boston, Sheff is nationally renowned in the areas of personal injury, wrongful death, construction site and brain injury litigation. Chair and founder of the MBA’s Workplace Safety Task Force, Sheff recently spearheaded the passage of a new Massachusetts worker safety law mandating proper training, supervision and safety equipment for temporary workers. In October, a national organization that promotes workplace safety will recognize Sheff for his groundbreaking work with respect to workplace injury and death.
An executive committee member of the National Traumatic Brain Injury Litigation Group, member of Trial Lawyers for Public Justice and lifetime fellow of the Massachusetts Bar Foundation (the philanthropic partner of the MBA), Sheff is also a member of the Academy of Catastrophic Injury Attorneys and a director of the Belli Society, a group recognized for innovative trial techniques.
Sheff has received numerous honors for his achievements as a litigator and an advocate. He was honored with MATA’s inaugural Excellence in Advocacy Award for his representation of children and adults who have suffered traumatic brain injury and received the ORT Award for integrity in the law. In addition, Sheff is a recipient of the AAJ’s Next Generation Award and a seven-time recipient of its Wiedeman Wysocki Award.
Sheff has also been recognized by the publication Lifesavers for preventing injury through aggressive representation of victims of defective products, and as a Boston magazine “Super Lawyer.”
Sheff graduated from the University of Michigan in 1980 and went on to earn his J.D. from Boston College Law School in 1984.
Alongside Sheff, the other 2013-14 MBA officers include President-elect Marsha V. Kazarosian, Haverhill; Vice President Martha Rush O’Mara, Melrose; Vice President Christopher P. Sullivan, Hingham; Treasurer Robert W. Harnais, Quincy; and Secretary Christopher A. Kenney, Sudbury.
