Biography
Ryan J. Sears is a graduate of Emory University and Washington University in St. Louis School of Law, where he was awarded the Judge Samuel Calhoun Scholarship and captained the school’s NITA mock trial team. While in law school, Ryan commissioned in the U.S. Navy JAG Corps. He is currently a Commander in the Navy Reserve JAG Corps and is a veteran of Afghanistan. He serves as a reserve trial judge for the Navy and Marine Corps Trial Judiciary. He has defended and prosecuted service members in some of the most high-profile cases in the Navy, including matters that received coverage by The Washington Post, Jacksonville Times-Union, Navy Times and Marine Corps Times.
Professor Sears has represented hundreds of service members before the military’s Physical Evaluation Boards (PEB) and the Department of Veterans Affairs. He is one of the few attorneys to serve multiple tours as a PEB counsel for the Navy and Marine Corps. His advocacy for his PEB clients was so instrumental to the well-being of these individuals that his division received the 2015 American Bar Association’s Standing Committee on Legal Assistance for Military Personnel Special Recognition Award.