Maxie G. Kizer


Maxie G. Kizer

Pine Bluff

Maxie G. Kizer

Maxie Kizer used a little entrepreneurship to come up with a program that was profitable both for his law office and Jefferson County.

Kizer, who began his career with Jay Dickey (the association actually began when Kizer was in high school working at Dickey's Baskin-Robbins franchise), went out on his own in 1995. In private practice he accepted court-appointed and criminal cases.

"I saw a window of opportunity to do that on a contract basis," said Kizer, admitting that being out on his own was difficult.

Jefferson County distributed felony Circuit Court cases piecemeal to area lawyers. Kizer proposed his office serve as a contracted public defender to the county. He had to sell county officials on the idea, and they went with it in 1991.

To set up its own public defender's office would have been very expensive for the county.

"It's been a win-win situation. It's worked for me, I know, and it worked for the county,'" Kizer said. And he's helped other counties set up a similar arrangement with other lawyers.

Kizer, 38, covers two of the three circuit divisions, and case load has been drastically reduced.

He believes in hustle, likes the idea of self-employment and said he's learned that the law business means spending more time dealing with personalities than with facts in the law.

Outside the courtroom, he and his wife have three boys, and he coaches and sponsors youth baseball teams.