Kenneth S. Canfield
Mr. Canfield grew up in the Philadelphia area and Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, where he graduated from high school. He received his undergraduate education at Dartmouth College, summa cum laude, and legal education at Yale Law School, where he was an editor of the Yale Law Journal.
After finishing law school, Mr. Canfield became a law clerk in Montgomery, Alabama to the legendary federal judge, Frank M. Johnson, Jr., who was renowned for his civil rights and constitutional decisions. Mr. Canfield next served in the administration of President Carter, first as a Special Assistant to the head of the Civil Division in the Justice Department, and then as a Special Assistant to the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency.
From 1981 through 1985, Mr. Canfield practiced law in Denver, Colorado with Haddon, Morgan & Foreman. He then joined the Atlanta firm now known as Kilpatrick Townsend. In 1988, he became a solo practitioner until founding Doffermyre Shields Canfield & Knowles in 1990.
Mr. Canfield's practice focused on complex civil litigation, particularly class actions, personal injury cases, and business disputes. He was appointed as lead counsel or to other leadership positions in class actions and federal multi-district litigation proceedings involving a wide range of subject areas. Examples include the Equifax data breach litigation in Georgia and the managed care litigation in Florida, both of which recovered over $1 billion in relief. He also handled numerous constitutional, civil rights, and election cases for plaintiffs and successfully represented a death row inmate in habeas proceedings who eventually was freed after nearly 30 years behind bars.
In April 1999, Mr. Canfield was appointed by the state's governor to the Georgia Judicial Nominating Commission, which screened applicants for state judgeships. He also sat on committees responsible for screening applicants to the federal bench and was President Obama’s advisor on Georgia vacancies. Along with Ralph Knowles and two others, Mr. Canfield ran the 2006 re-election campaign of Georgia’s chief justice. That work led to Mr. Canfield being featured in Hot Coffee, an HBO documentary film about tort reform that premiered at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival.
Mr. Canfield was recognized in publications such as Best Lawyers in America and U.S. News and World Report, named a "Georgia Superlawyer" by Atlanta Magazine, and listed in the Chambers USA guide to "America's leading lawyers for business." According to Chambers USA: "Kenneth Canfield is revered as a 'brilliant litigator,' particularly in relation to his work on complex class actions." The 2010 edition of the guide hailed Mr. Canfield as a “brilliant trial lawyer with refreshingly good people skills who gets extraordinary results for his clients.” The 2018 edition reported that Mr. Canfield was "the premier plaintiff lawyer in the Atlanta market."
Mr. Canfield was a president of the Georgia Trial Lawyers Association, a director of the Atlanta College of Trial Advocacy, and a contributing author of the Georgia Trial Practice Manual. He was a frequent lecturer on legal topics. Among other forums, he spoke before the American Bar Association, the American Medical Association, the Association of Trial Lawyers of America, and the Georgia Trial Lawyers Association. He was a Master of the Lumpkin Inn of Court.
