Alum Honored by State Bar

Sorrell Trope '49 Receives Lifetime Achievement Award

By Maria Iacobo

After dedicating over sixty years to the legal profession, Sorrell Trope was recently honored with the California State Bar’s Lifetime Achievement Award. The accolade is the highest award a family law lawyer can receive and was given by the Family Law Executive Committee of the California State Bar.

Trope specializes in family law and founded his firm Trope and Trope LLP in 1949. A pioneer in the field, his work prompted the California State Bar to formally recognize family law as a specialized area of law.  Today his firm is the largest California law firm to specialize in this field.

Trope received his B.A. and J.D. from the University of Southern California and remains loyal to him alma mater. He continues to publish academic work, lecture, and serve as an Adjunct Professor of Law at USC Gould and a member of the USC Gould School of Law’s Board of Councilors.

Sorrell Trope '49

“Sorrell is a legend,” says USC Gould School of Law Dean Robert K. Rasmussen.  “He transformed the field of family law, and still practices at the highest level. You cannot think of family law in Southern California and not think of Sorrel Trope,”

He is also known for handling many high profile divorce proceedings; his clients include Cary Grant, Nicole Kidman, Nicholas Cage and Elin Nordegren.

At the awards ceremony, Trope was recognized as setting the “gold standard for trial preparation in family law cases” and teaching a “whole generation of family law lawyers how to try a family law case.”
 
In addition to being recognized as a Specialist in Family Law by The State Bar of California Board of Legal Specialization, Trope was awarded the Los Angeles County Bar Spencer Brandeis Award for outstanding contribution to the practice of family law (1998).