A.J. Hernandez is a Jacksonville personal injury attorney at Farah & Farah. Serving clients out of the firm’s downtown location just off Adams Street, A.J. takes on all kinds of negligence cases, including car accidents, trucking accidents, slip and falls, trip and falls, premises liability, product liability, wrongful death cases, and more.
A.J. attended Florida Coastal School of Law on a full scholarship and graduated in the top 20% of his class with certificates in Civil Litigation and Legal Research and Writing. In law school, A.J. earned numerous awards, including the Dean’s Scholar Awards and the Martha Sonnenschein Memorial Scholarship award, competed in several national mock trial and moot court competitions, and was invited to join the Law Review and the Harding Inn of the Phi Delta Phi International Legal Honor Society.
Before coming to Farah & Farah, A.J. represented both plaintiffs and defendants in a wide variety of personal injury cases at a well-respected boutique civil litigation law firm in Jacksonville, Florida. While practicing law in Florida, A.J. studied for and passed the Georgia Bar exam in 2022. With years of experience on both the plaintiff and defense sides of personal injury cases, A.J. knows how the defense is going to approach a case and uses that to his and his clients’ advantage. A.J. leverages this vast experience as a litigation attorney to allow his clients to stand toe to toe with big insurance and giant corporations in the courtroom.
As one of only 6% of U.S. lawyers of Hispanic descent, A.J. is proud to be able to represent and communicate with our Spanish-speaking clients. It can be hard for people to find attorneys who speak Spanish, but Farah & Farah makes it easy for our Spanish-speaking clients in Florida and Georgia to get in touch with A.J. and his litigation team.
Everything We Do Here Is To Make It Easy on Our Clients
I love working here at Farah & Farah. Yes, this is a big law firm, but it is extremely well-organized and runs like a well-oiled machine. The firm gives its attorneys all the tools and resources they need to fight for their clients. The many layers of support available for both clients and attorneys ensure that the entire process operates seamlessly. The systems in place here are designed to encourage open communication and streamline the experience for our clients, which makes it easier for Farah & Farah’s attorneys to represent their clients to the absolute best of their abilities.
My Work on Both Sides of the Courtroom Gives Me Great Insight
After law school, I went to work for a small firm where my time was pretty evenly split between representing plaintiffs and defendants in civil litigation, almost entirely in personal injury cases. At that firm, I was mentored by highly experienced litigators, tried several cases, for both plaintiffs and defendants, in both state and federal courts, argued an appeal before a Florida appellate court, and gained a tremendous amount of experience and all the necessary skills a litigating personal injury attorney needs to be successful.
Doing both plaintiff and defense work for several years was stimulating and challenging because I had to “switch hats” from the plaintiff to the defense side, or vice versa, at any given moment throughout the day. Working exclusively for accident victims now, I get to leverage my experience on the defense side. I can put myself in a defense attorney’s shoes because I’ve been there myself. I know how the defense will approach a case, the types of questions they’ll ask, and the legal arguments they’ll make, and I can analyze my cases from their point of view so I can make sure my clients and I are as prepared as possible for anything defense attorneys can throw at us.
I Love Being an Advocate
What truly invigorates me in my role as an accident attorney in Jacksonville is that I’m helping ordinary people get their lives back on track. When you’re injured or lose a loved one in an accident, your whole life can be derailed in an instant. Accident victims often find themselves unable to work, drowning in bills, and facing a mountain of medical expenses. Facing off against huge corporations and insurance companies, or steering a case through the complexities of litigation, is a daunting task for the average person to take on alone. It’s my passion to champion the cause of accident victims in Florida and Georgia, ensuring they receive the justice and compensation they rightfully deserve. There’s no better feeling than seeing the relief and appreciation on a client’s face when I can deliver a great result in their case.
Legal Research and Writing: The Secret Superpower of Top Attorneys
One skill I’ve honed as an attorney is legal research and writing. In college, I double-majored in political science and philosophy, which means I was constantly researching and writing arguments on various issues. In law school, I was a member of the Moot Court Honor Board where I competed in seven national moot court competitions around the country that each required extensive legal research and writing to prepare briefs and oral arguments for both sides of complex legal issues. One of my proudest moments was winning the award of Best Petitioner’s Brief in the National Latino Law Student Association’s Moot Court Competition in New York, New York, alongside my co-author and fellow Farah & Farah attorney, Jose Cruz-Pagan.
My experience in moot court made me love the appellate process, especially the many hours of legal research and writing involved. In my first role as an attorney, I wrote my client’s initial appellant and reply briefs and gave oral argument before the Florida Second District Court of Appeal with conviction, facts, and strong legal precedent to back up my arguments. I put these same skills to work during motion practice in trial courts. While it takes hours of legal research and diligence, I really enjoy the process of researching the law and preparing my briefs and oral arguments because I’m confident in the legal research I do and the written arguments I prepare for the courts.
Litigation is like a legal chess match. Coming up with creative strategies and legal arguments while preparing every case like it’s going to trial is key to being a skilled and successful litigation attorney. I love getting into the weeds of legal research, studying the statutes, case law, and legal doctrines to prepare the best case and strongest arguments possible before we ever set foot in a courtroom.
Fighting for Local Victims of Negligence
One case I’ll never forget involved a client who was taken to an emergency room of a hospital in Florida, where his condition later worsened and he ended up having to be sedated, placed on a ventilator, and rushed to the ICU. After being extubated and waking up, he complained of intense hip pain and X-rays revealed that he suffered catastrophic bilateral hip fractures at some point during the 55 hours he was unconscious and on the ventilator. The hospital denied liability and claimed it couldn’t explain what caused his injuries.
We filed suit against the hospital and pursued justice for our client under the legal doctrine of res ipsa loquitur, Latin for “the thing speaks for itself.” Under the doctrine of res ipsa loquitur, when an unconscious patient under the exclusive control of a hospital suffers an injury unrelated to their medical treatment and it was a type of injury that would not normally occur in the absence of negligence, that patient can ask the jury to infer that their injury was the result of the hospital’s negligence. With over 10,000 pages of documents and records, dozens of depositions, and expert testimony filed in the trial court, you can be sure I did my research and thoroughly prepared before arguing this landmark case before the Florida Second District Court of Appeal, where Chief Judge Daniel H. Sleet called it “a very important case” under Florida law.
I was able to win a reversal of summary judgment and reversal of the motion in limine order that had been entered in favor of the hospital. This case sets a great precedent for future plaintiffs who are injured while unconscious and in the care of medical professionals. It was the first case to consider this res ipsa loquitur issue in a medical malpractice action since Florida adopted the federal standard for summary judgment.
Downtime Is Important Too
In my time away from the office, I love traveling, reading philosophy and history books, playing video games, and watching movies to relax and unwind. My wife Hazel and I are also huge foodies, which means you’ll likely find us around town trying new things at all the best restaurants.
