MTACDL - Lawyers of the Year
2023 MTACDL Timer Moses Award: Chuck Watson
Timer Moses Lifetime Achievement Award
Presented by Herman Watson at the Chico Awards Dinner on March 9, 2023:
Chuck Watson had the unique distinction of having the 2023 Timer Moses Award presented to him by his son. Herman Watson, who works with his father in Bozeman, ticked off the qualifications required of the award winner and why his father fulfilled them so well:
“to foster the integrity, independence, and expertise of the criminal defense profession”
- standing up to bully government and law enforcement (NAACP)
- Life Member of NACDL
- Co-founder of MTACDL
- Life and Board Member of ABCL
“Disseminating by lecture, seminars, and publications such theories, technologies, and techniques that support or promote the field of criminal defense advocacy”
- CLE, inviting national experts to opine their consensus on flat fees, then a contentious issue, thereby establishing precedent and closure
- Member of Academy of Forensic Sciences
“preserving, protecting, and defending the adversary system of justice and the state and federal constitutions”
- trying cases without getting paid
- embodies the archetype
- Countless jury trials (Ruwo last year)
- story of Ruwo
Personal history
- interned w/ Bobby Lee Cook, scoundrel hero of North Georgia
- est. Watson Law in 1992, one of the region’s premier criminal defense firms
- traveled to NYC to research, found Gallatin County Treatment Court
- Criminal Justice Coordinating Council
- Chuck unwaveringly fought injustice and government overreach, holding court in the Downtown Co-op
- mentor to many
Most importantly, sensitive and caring person, who loves his children and his friends
Chuck Watson accepting the microphone from Herman Watson
