Jay worked as a corporate auditor at Regions Bancshares prior to entering law school. After law school, Jay served as law clerk to Justice H. Mark Kennedy on the Supreme Court of Alabama. He then entered private practice with Beasley Allen. Jay has practiced law at Beasley Allen since 1997, focusing in the areas of consumer fraud and complex commercial litigation. The majority of the cases Jay handles involve life insurance, reinsurance agreements, annuities, telecommunications issues, self-insured health plans and hospital pricing practices. Of the numerous cases he has tried, four returned jury verdicts in excess of $1 million. The verdicts in three of these cases were as follows: $1.88 million against Alfa Life Insurance Company, $3.6 million against Liberty National Insurance Company, and $12.4 million against Horace Mann Life Insurance Company.

In the past few years, Jay has turned his focus to class actions. He has a digital cable class against Charter Communications; several classes against major banks and insurance underwriters involving the sale of bonus rate annuities; several classes against failed self-insured health insurance plans; and classes against several major hospital chains for overcharging uninsured patients. Jay is lead counsel in five separate deferred annuity class actions in the federal courts of Alabama, Tennessee, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and New York. He is lead counsel in New York for a national class of insureds against a large insurance company who overcharged juveniles as “adult smokers”. Jay is lead counsel in a class against the fifth largest hospital chain in the United States for price gouging uninsured patients. Additionally, Jay heads up a class action against Blue Cross Blue Shield for illegally reducing payments to all dentists who practice in Alabama.

Jay is serving as co-lead counsel representing Leslie Newman, the Tennessee Insurance and Commerce Commissioner, in a multi-district litigation (MDL) proceeding in Memphis, Tennessee. The case involves the collapse of three separate major malpractice carriers in that state: General Reinsurance, PricewaterhouseCoopers, Millman USA, their board members, key executives and several offshore corporate entities. The litigation stems from a complicated reinsurance scheme that drove the three companies to collapse, leaving thousands of policyholders uninsured and exposed. The damages exceed $700 million. Beasley Allen is prosecuting the case jointly with the Virginia Insurance Commissioner.

Jay has represented over 20,000 clients at Beasley Allen resulting in settlements valued at over $200 million. As in the past, he continues to guide settlements nationwide for individual clients and on a global basis.

Jay has spoken frequently on consumer fraud issues and class actions, also authoring several articles that were published in the Alabama Trial Lawyers Journal. He serves on the Executive Committee and Board of Governors for the Alabama Trial Lawyers Association.

Jay is married to the former Jennifer Woodman of Montgomery, and they have two children. He attends church at St. James United Methodist Church in Montgomery, where he serves as a member of the Board of Trustees. He is not only an advisory member of the William O. Nowell Scholarship Fund, but Jay is also active in fundraising for the Montgomery Young Life Christian Organization.