Columbia attorney Jack Swerling hailed as a ‘giant’ by SC Chief Justice Kittredge

Columbia criminal defense lawyer Jack Swerling thought he was going to make a few informal remarks on Friday at a lawyers’ continuing legal education seminar on his more than 50 years as one of the state’s primo courtroom attorneys.

After all, Swerling, 78, was listed in the program on “Federal Practice in South Carolina” as the 11 a.m. speaker who would engage in a give-and-take with the dozens of lawyers who were getting their mandatory credit hours at a daylong legal seminar.

But to everyone’s surprise — certainly Swerling’s — who should walk in at 11 a.m. but S.C. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Kittredge, who announced he was giving a rare legal award to Swerling: the Chief Justice’s Award for Outstanding Contributions to the Legal Profession. The last such award was given out by former Chief Justice Jean Toal, who retired in 2015.

“When you’re in the presence of Jack Swerling, you’re in the presence of greatness, an icon in our profession,” Kittredge told the group, who gave Swerling not one, but two, standing ovations.

There’s not enough time to list all of Swerling’s accomplishments, said the chief justice, who said the attorney “in terms of legal intellect and skill ... has received every superlative” in the profession and “achieved greatness on all fronts.”

Swerling’s awards include being a South Carolina Superlawyer, “year in, year out”; listed in the annual ranking of Best Lawyers in America, a fellow in the American College of Trial Lawyers, and a member of elite legal groups such as the International Academy of Trial Lawyers, the American Academy of Appellate Lawyers, and the American Board of Criminal Lawyers, Kittredge said.

“Membership in these organizations is very selective,” Kittredge said, explaining for example that membership in the International Academy of Trial Lawyers is limited to 600 members worldwide.

Swerling, who teaches at the University of South Carolina Rice School of Law, has likely mentored more young lawyers than any other attorney in the state, communicating to them not only the practical skills a lawyer needs to know, but also “the beauty of the law,” Kittredge said.

Swerling also has a rare reverence for “the majesty of the courtroom,” Kittredge said. “He understands at his core, the importance of a lawyer knowing how to try a case, to achieve zealous advocacy alongside civility and professionalism.”

After the chief justice’s speech and a standing ovation, Swerling’s slightly perplexed first words were, “I got completely sucked in on this!” to appreciative laughter. Then, Swerling said, “For him (the chief justice) to give me this award is really very special to me.”

The “hoax” to get Swerling to the classroom at the S.C. Bar building off Taylor Street in downtown Columbia was engineered by the chief justice, Swerling’s longtime friend lawyer Dick Harpootlian, federal Judge Sherri Lydon and Greenville attorney Beattie Ashmore, a former federal prosecutor.

Missing from the chief justice’s remarks was the more colorful side of Swerling, who due to his frank and friendly nature, his deep voice and high-profile cases has long been a familiar public face of the state’s legal profession.

Because of the hundreds of killers he’s represented, Swerling’s nickname is “Mr. Murder,” and with his 6-foot-5-inch bearish frame, journalists for years have compared him to the former professional wrestler André the Giant or an offensive tackle in the National Football League .

Swerling entered the public eye in the early 1980s, when he was appointed to represent serial killer Donald “Pee Wee” Gaskins in a much-publicized death penalty trial. Gaskins was accused of booby-trapping a radio with high explosives and blowing up an inmate at the S.C. Department of Corrections. Swerling lost, and Gaskins was eventually executed, but his career was made.

“That case established me as a criminal attorney,” Swerling told the National Law Journal in 1987. “People knew if I would take Pee Wee’s case, I would take their armed robbery.”

Friends and longtime Swerling colleagues on hand to see him get his surprise award were lawyers Joe McCulloch, Debbie Barbier, Greg Harris, Harry Goldberg, Dan Goldberg, Harrison Sanders and Richland County Probate Judge Amy McCulloch.

Approximately 30 of Swerling’s relatives and friends also were on hand, including his wife of 54 years, Erika; son Bryan Swerling; a New York attorney; daughter, Stephanie Swerling, a Washington attorney; and younger sister, Susan Marion.

“People don’t realize how many lives Jack has touched. He’s been a mentor, a professor, a boss who hired hundreds of law clerks and a leader for so many generations of young lawyers, including me,” said Harris, 63, who was mentored by Swerling in 1986 as a young lawyer. “He’s mentored every generation that has come down the pike in the last 45-50 years. He’s the very fabric of the way criminal law is practiced in this state.”

This story was originally published December 14, 2024 at 5:00 AM.