Timothy Gaarder

Timothy Gaarder is a trial attorney at Lucas Law Firm, LLC in Kansas City, Missouri, who has tried cases to juries across the United States for 20 years. His practice focuses on representing individuals and families who have suffered significant harm, injury, or loss due to the negligence of another person or company. Gaarder has obtained more than $95 million in jury verdicts, ranging from wrongful death cases to internal injuries from motor vehicle crashes. He earned the C.A.L.I.

Award for the top Trial Advocacy student in 2004 while at the University of Missouri School of Law, and he has been named a Missouri and Kansas Super Lawyer from 2021 to the present and a Rising Star from 2009 through 2019. In 2019, he earned a Top-5 Plaintiff's Verdict in Missouri, recognized by Missouri Lawyers Media, in E.H.S. v. BNSF Railway Company, working alongside Mike Ponder, Kathy Wolz, and Tom Jones of Davis, Bethune & Jones. In 2025, Gaarder and Chad Lucas obtained a Top-7 Missouri verdict of $30 million in Smading v. Ward out of Henry County.

Gaarder maintains a railroad-specialty practice litigating derailments, grade-crossing wrecks, and employee injury and death cases, and also handles auto and motorcycle product defects, tractor-trailer crashes, traumatic brain injuries, medical malpractice, and premises liability matters. He is a member of the Missouri Bar Association, the Kansas Bar Association, the Kansas City Metropolitan Bar Association, and the Missouri Association of Trial Attorneys, and has served two terms as President of the Railroad Law Section of the American Association for Justice. He earned his B.S.B.A. and B.A. from the University of Missouri in 2001, cum laude, and his J.D. from the University of Missouri in 2004, with honors and Dean's List recognition.