David Villa

David Villa knows what it’s like when the government has a grip on your life — and he’s built his career standing between drivers and the power of the state. Before defending Connecticut motorists, he served as a prosecutor in mid-coast Maine, where he resolved hundreds of criminal cases through negotiated pleas, bench trials, and jury trials. That time on the other side gave him a prosecutor’s insight into how the state builds and argues its cases.

But David recognized early that his place wasn’t with the state and its vast resources. It was with the doubted, the accused, and the everyday driver facing a system stacked against them. Having been both doubted and bullied in his own life, few things satisfy him more than proving a skeptic wrong or knocking a bully down a peg.

A nontraditional law student, David earned a string of academic honors at UConn Law — top student in several classes, a negotiation champion, and a frequent competitor representing the school against other law programs. He cut his teeth in live Connecticut courtrooms through the UConn Law Criminal Clinic, argued cases in the Animal Clinic, and interned with both the Stamford/Norwalk State’s Attorney’s Office and the U.S. Attorney’s Office in New Haven. He is no stranger to Connecticut’s courts.

In a life before law, David served in the military, deploying to Afghanistan and Iraq and making dozens of jumps with the historic 82nd Airborne Division. He was later involuntarily recalled and stop-lossed during a second deployment. A born contrarian and battle-tested competitor, he isn’t afraid of a fight — and if your case means going to war, it won’t be the first war he’s been to.