James T.R. Jones

James T.R. Jones received his B.A. with highest distinction from the University of Virginia, where he was inducted into the Phi Beta Kappa Society, and his J.D. with honors from Duke University School of Law, where he was selected for the Order of the Coif. He served on the Editorial Board of the Duke Law Journal.

Before entering an academic career, he clerked for a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit and a magistrate judge of the United States District Court for the Middle District of Florida. In addition, he worked in private practice for firms in New York and Florida. In 1985, he entered teaching as a Bigelow Teaching Fellow and Lecturer in Law at the University of Chicago Law School. He joined the faculty of the Louis D. Brandeis School of Law at the University of Louisville in 1986.

Professor Jones has written a number of articles, including seven on the use of tort law to enforce the legal rights of domestic violence victims. He also has spoken extensively on this topic, most recently in 2000 at the Symposium on Integrating Responses to Domestic Violence conducted at the Loyola University of New Orleans School of Law and co-sponsored by that institution and the American Bar Association Commission on Domestic Violence.

His research and teaching interests include domestic violence, with an emphasis on professional liability, torts, decedents' estates, legal writing, written advocacy, and mental illness among professionals. Professor Jones belongs to the Florida Bar and the Legal Writing Institute.

In his 2008 article Walking the Tightrope of Bipolar Disorder: The Secret Life of a Law Professor, Professor Jones for the first time disclosed his decades-long battle with the severe mental illness bipolar disorder, which is also known as manic-depressive illness. Since then he has written and spoken extensively about successful professionals who suffer from serious psychiatric diseases. In particular he has addressed numerous classes of law, medical, nursing, psychology, social work, and occupational therapy students, demonstrating to them that many of the stereotypes their professions hold about at least some of their clients with mental illnesses are unjustified and inaccurate.

In recognition of his mental health advocacy efforts, Mental Health America of Kentucky, Kentucky's oldest mental health education and advocacy organization, presented him with the Clifford W. Beers Mental Health Consumer Award for 2010. The award is a functioning bell, a facsimile of the Mental Health America bell that is the symbol of the country's oldest and largest nonprofit organization that addresses all aspects of mental health and mental illness.

On November 8, 2013, Professor Jones was presented with the David S. Stoner Uncommon Counselor Award by the Dave Nee Foundation at a gala in New York City. Professor Jones for his mental health advocacy work.

In his 2011 book, A Hidden Madness, Professor Jones tells the story of his unrelenting struggle against severe mental illness. It is the saga of an accomplished individual who has reached the pinnacle of his profession despite suffering for over 30 years from the severe mental illness bipolar disorder. He has done so mostly in silence because of fear of stigma. Extreme childhood bullying helped cause his condition, which has seen him hospitalized five times in psychiatric facilities for periods as long as six months. The story offers both real hope for those afflicted by serious mental illness and deep insight into their many symptoms, numerous drugs, periodic crises, and potential triumphs.