About The Firm
BTNL was born of the 80+ years of experience its founding partners gained collectively at a southeastern regional law firm. Now, seven years later, working synergistically with one another in our own firm, we focus on the litigation, insurance coverage issues, and environmental challenges and opportunities faced by our clients. These clients range from small towns to international insurance conglomerates, and from family-owned businesses to major industrial manufacturers and pharmaceutical companies.
Three of our partners – Bruce Barze, Spence Taylor, and Todd Lowther – are tenacious trial lawyers with a proven track record of success in high stakes litigation and complex legal problems. We pride ourselves on being, first and foremost, trial lawyers and not merely litigators. We don’t view pre-trial and discovery activities as an end unto themselves, but rather we undertake these activities in order to put on our client’s best case at trial. We know every case does not end up in trial, but we also know our clients get the best settlements when our opponents realize that we are ready and willing to try our clients’ cases.
Equally important, we are intimately familiar with the nuances of insurance coverage matters – both for policy issuers and for policy holders. Rarely does a litigated matter not have insurance coverage issues. In fact, sometimes litigation is focused solely on who owes or is owed coverage. That is why a robust representation includes a thorough understanding of a client’s obligations or rights – and an ability to fight for them if necessary.
Our fourth founding partner, Jim Noles, assumed a position as Of Counsel with the firm in 2025, after accepting a position as a Professor of Practice with Auburn University’s College of Forestry, Wildlife, and Environment. In the college, Jim now teaches a number of courses and is responsible for developing its Environmental Law minor. Jim is an experienced practitioner of environmental law who has for 27 years effectively counseled and advised his clients proactively with the goal of avoiding, or at least managing, problems in the environmental arena. In his Of Counsel role, Jim continues, on a limited basis, to advise the firm and its clients with respect to environmental legal matters.
BTNL’s lawyers are graduates of top undergraduate universities and law schools. Our home is Birmingham, Alabama, but we have hard-earned experience in 30 states, from Washington County, Alabama, to Washington, DC, and we represent clients from Birmingham, Alabama to Baroda, India With grateful appreciation, we’re proud to say that we’ve been recognized by our peers in The Best Lawyers in America, Chambers USA, Mid-South Super Lawyers, Benchmark Litigation, and other, similar publications.
But none of that means anything without the values to which we strive to adhere – to represent clients zealously, ethically, and honorably. To tell hard truths and to return phone calls. To look for ways to make our community a better, stronger place. To look out for one another. And to keep a sense of humor day in and day out. When we say that's BTNL, that’s what we mean.