Forty Under 40: Michael Hodson

Michael Hodson, 37, probably holds the record for the fastest acquittal in Northwest Arkansas. It took a jury only seven minutes to find his client in a criminal case innocent, and the defendant had at one point even confessed to the crime.

That 2001 jury trial was only Hodson’s second, but by 2002 his firm saw a 50 percent increase in business. The Dallas native attributes the success to his firm’s maturing abilities and reputation.

A 1997 graduate from the University of Texas with a bachelor’s degree in political science, Hodson worked as a legislative assistant for U.S. Sen. David Pryor, D-Ark., from 1994 to 1997. He worked on Mark Pryor’s unsuccessful bid for state attorney general in 1994 before heading to the University of Arkansas’ School of Law.

He was back on Mark Pryor’s AG team in 1998 when it won the election. Hodson served as the AG’s press secretary until 1999 when he started a solo law practice in Fayetteville. The firm has since grown to five lawyers.

Hodson volunteers for Big Brothers, Big Sisters and is helping start The Innocence Project-Arkansas, part of a nationwide nonprofit effort to help wrongly convicted defendants.

An avid poker player and reader, he highly recommends Malcolm Gladwell’s nonfiction book “Blink.”