Michael Shepherd
About Michael Shepherd
Michael Shepherd is a Partner and Co-leader of the Personal Injury Department at the Law Offices of James Scott Farrin in Durham, North Carolina. He joined the firm in 2010 and brings approximately 18 years of legal-industry experience.
Before joining Farrin, Shepherd worked as a Senior Claims Representative at a major national insurance company, bringing "the other side" perspective to personal injury practice.
Shepherd earned his Bachelor of Arts in Criminal Justice from Indiana University in Bloomington in 1996 and his Juris Doctor from North Carolina Central University School of Law in Durham in 2009.
He is admitted to practice in North Carolina and Virginia. His professional memberships include the American Bar Association and the North Carolina Bar Association, and he is a past president of the Eastern NC Chapter of the Chartered Property Casualty Underwriters.
Proven verdicts and settlements at Law Offices of James Scott Farrin
These results are credited to Law Offices of James Scott Farrin. A result appears under an attorney's own name only when a published source names them as counsel on the case.
Farrin co-lead counsel Gary Jackson won an $8 million class settlement for roughly 6,500 residents forced from their homes by the 2022 ammonium nitrate fire at the Winston Weaver fertilizer plant, with a separate $4.5 million for affected businesses.
A Johnston County jury awarded $5.1 million to the family of Joan Drake, killed when a driver going 98 mph struck her car as she turned into a Clayton Walmart, after Farrin attorneys Coleman Cowan and Donald Clack tried the case without putting on a single medical bill.
A mother and her two teenage daughters were seriously hurt in an October 2018 head-on crash on North Carolina Highway 49 with a company truck driven by an unlicensed man. After the injury claims were resolved by agreement, a federal court held that the construction company's commercial excess policy covered the accident and that interest was owed on top. The Fourth Circuit affirmed in August 2025, and the family's total recovery reached $2,861,458.
Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome. Each case is unique and depends on its own facts.
