Phillip S. Aurbach

During my 42 years of practice, I spent much of that time as an arbitrator for both the American Arbitration Association (AAA) and Advanced Resolution Management (ARM) as well as 17 years as a Nevada Supreme Court Settlement Judge. I know how important it is to my clients and Clark County residents to have a court system that can deliver justice swiftly, but fairly. This requires hard work by our judges to issue decisions quickly and assist other judges in a confidential settlement process so the litigants can move forward with their lives and businesses.

I have also written articles, practice manuals, and lectured for the Nevada State Bar, the Clark County Bar and various national legal education companies on evictions, mortgage and trust deed foreclosures, personal property security interests under the U.C.C., as well as authoring two chapters of the Nevada Civil Practice Manual.

I have lived in Vegas most of my life. My dad was a pit boss at the Desert Inn when it opened in the 1950's. He sent for my mom, my sister and me from Florida when my dad was settled in Las Vegas. Except for college, I've been in Vegas ever since.
I was a paper boy at age 14 delivering newspapers at 3:30 am every morning on my bicycle. In high school, I wasn't a gifted athlete, so I worked after school and on weekends practiced tennis. I couldn't afford to pay for tennis instructions, so I strung tennis rackets and washed tennis courts in exchange for lessons.

In my senior year at Clark High School I worked at Shakey's Pizza Restaurant and graduated in 1969 with a B+ grade point average. I played varsity tennis and managed to get a scholarship to play college tennis. I paid my own way through college with a tennis scholarship and a work-study program. In 1973, I earned a degree in Business Administration with a Finance emphasis. I worked for a year at a bank and wanted to go to law school, but Nevada didn't have Boyd Law School at that time.

I went to the University of San Diego School of Law where I served as Research Editor of the San Diego Law Review, worked odd jobs and took out student loans to pay for law school.

After graduating in 1977, I came back to Vegas and got my first job as Deputy District Attorney in the Clark County District Attorney's Office. I then entered private practice and learned how to practice law from some of the best lawyers in town. There were less than 1,500 attorneys in Las Vegas at that time and most attorneys were happy to share their experience.