Josh is uniquely qualified to handle significant business litigation. He is a trial lawyer who actually tries cases (and has never lost a jury trial), but he spent the first 10 years of his legal career exclusively handling transactional matters. He represents individuals and businesses in their most important matters, including “bet the company” lawsuits and serious criminal offenses.

After graduating from Vanderbilt University School of Law in 1997, Josh joined a national law firm in Houston, Texas. Josh spent 10 years at that firm, becoming a partner in 2004. During his years in Houston, Josh focused on mergers and acquisitions, private equity and venture capital transactions and securities offerings and regulations, as well as general corporate governance and business matters. He handled large and complex business matters, including representing a publicly traded master limited partnership in its $3 billion acquisition of pipeline assets from another public company, as well as representing a global EPC company in its approximately $245 million sale to an Australian public company.

In 2007, Josh and his family left Houston to move home to Missouri. When he founded Collins & Jones with his longtime friend Eric Collins, Josh transformed his practice and became a trial lawyer. Since then, Josh has tried hundreds of civil and criminal cases in courts throughout Missouri and Kansas regularly, obtaining outstanding results for his clients.

Josh represents clients in both civil and criminal cases. On the civil side, Josh has handled a wide variety of matters, including contract and business litigation, construction disputes, trust and fiduciary litigation, personal injury and tort cases and real property matters, in both state and federal court. Although Josh focuses his practice at the trial court level, he has extensive appellate experience, handling appeals before the Missouri Supreme Court, the Missouri Court of Appeals and the federal Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals.

Josh has extensive experience in criminal cases, including the most serious offenses. A former prosecutor, Josh has tried nearly every kind of criminal matter, including murder, rape, drug trafficking, burglary and assault. Josh has never lost a criminal jury trial, whether as a prosecutor or defense lawyer. Among other accomplishments, Josh obtained a court-ordered dismissal of a first-degree murder charge following a preliminary hearing in Missouri. He also won a dismissal in a first-degree drug trafficking case when he succeeded in having all of the State’s evidence suppressed because it was obtained in violation of the Fourth Amendment. Josh has an excellent understanding of the constitutional issues involved in criminal cases, which can often be the key to successfully defending a criminal defendant.

A native of Osceola, Missouri, Josh attended college at Yale University, where he earned a B.A. in History. In 1997, Josh received his J.D. from Vanderbilt University School of Law. Josh and his wife Debbie have three children and live on a farm in Osceola.