Robert W. Chestney

2004 Georgia Super Lawyer®.
Only two lawyers in the entire state of Georgia were selected by their peers to be Super Lawyers® for 2004 in the limited area of DUI/DWI Defense--Bob Chestney and his partner, Mike Hawkins.

Board Certified by the National College for DUI Defense.
Only four lawyers in the entire state of Georgia are board certified by the prestigious National College for DUI Defense--Bob Chestney and Mike Hawkins are two of them.

Mr. Chestney has been a member of the Georgia "Defense of Drinking Drivers" group since its inception in the early 1990's. This organization of lawyers who vigorously defend DUI charges presented Mr. Chestney with LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD in 2000 and honored him again in 2002 as DUI LAWYER OF THE YEAR.

Mr. Chestney has been a criminal defense lawyer for 28 years, and since 1993 his practice has been exclusively devoted to defending DUI and Vehicular Homicide cases. He has handled over 1000 DUI cases, and has actually been lead counsel in about 100 DUI jury trials, and well over 200 bench trials. However, the majority of his cases have been successfully resolved without a trial (see our "Results" page). Since 1995, Mr. Chestney has been recognized by Martindale-Hubbell with their highest "av" rating, and is presently listed in their Bar Register of Preeminent Lawyers.

In addition to his trial work, Mr. Chestney maintains an aggressive appellate practice, having personally handled such significant cases as:

• Jorgensen v. State, 207 Ga.App. 545 (1993)
• State v. Causey, 215 Ga.App. 85 (1994
• Morgan v. State, 267 Ga. 203 (1996)
• Sayers v. State, 226 Ga.App. 645 (1997)
• Fantasia v. State, 268 Ga. 512 (1997)
• Thompson v. State, 229 Ga.App. 526 (1997)
• State v. Fischer, 230 Ga.App. 613 (1998)
• Price v. State, 269 Ga. 222 (1998)
• Klink v. State, 272 Ga. 605 (2000).

Mr. Chestney is a founding member of the National College for DUI Defense and served on their Board of Regents from 1995 to 2002. He is also former chair of the Criminal Law Section of the Atlanta Bar Association and served on its Board of Directors from 1999 to 2003. He is a member of the Atlanta Bar Association, the Cobb County Bar Association, the Gwinnett County Bar Association, the Georgia Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, and the American Academy of Forensic Sciences.

In addition to serving on the faculty of the National College for DUI Defense, held at the Harvard Law School each summer since 1995, Mr. Chestney has lectured on DUI Defense at programs and seminars in Georgia, Alabama, Florida, South Carolina, Missouri, Arizona, Hawaii and Nevada, including the National NACDL DUI Seminar in 2000 and 2003, as well as the National "Getting Tough on DWI" Seminar put on by the Minnesota Society for Criminal Justice in 2004. Mr. Chestney chaired the Georgia "Defense of Drinking Driver" programs for ICLE of Georgia in 1995, 1996 and 1997.

EDUCATION:
West Georgia College, B.S. Physics/Mathematics, 1969.
Florida State University, M.S. Mathematics, 1970.
Woodrow Wilson College of Law, J.D. Magna Cum Laude, 1976.