Unrivaled 2025: Priyanka Timblo of Holwell Shuster & Goldberg

You served as co-lead trial counsel with your firm partner Brendon DeMay in a jury trial against Walmart in an Arkansas federal court, winning a $101.2 million verdict in April 2024 for supplier London Luxury. Your client sued Walmart for breach of contract after the retailer allegedly reneged on a deal to buy millions of boxes of nitrile gloves during the Covid-19 pandemic. Can you tell us about your trial strategy?

Our trial strategy was to tell the more complete story—and tell it first.

We anticipated that Walmart’s defense would focus on all the things London Luxury allegedly did wrong in the deal, which Walmart said excused its own performance. We saw that their story had the potential to drown ours out.

That’s why we called seven Walmart witnesses as hostile directs on our case. The tactic allowed us to anchor our affirmative story—that Walmart entered into and reneged on the contract for its own business reasons—before Walmart’s case even began. Our theory of the case, out of the mouths of adverse witnesses, became the jury’s frame of reference. The judge’s post-trial decision rejecting Walmart’s motion for a new trial recognized this. There was a home in our theory for every fact that Walmart threw our way.

Of course, the groundwork for this trial strategy was laid in discovery—the unglamorous work of poring over documents and piecing together facts like a detective.

Can you describe a major hurdle that happened during the course of the trial, and how did you overcome it? 

For months before the trial began, we litigated a privilege waiver. Walmart insisted that the employee who signed the deal with London Luxury had gone rogue and entered the contract without authorization. In our view, this waived privilege over communications with its in-house lawyers since Walmart couldn’t claim its legal team had not approved the contract without providing evidence to back it up.

Our big break in the privilege fight came when Walmart put its in-house lawyer on its witness list. Two weeks before trial, we won our “sword-shield” motion and Walmart was ordered to produce documents.

But the documents trickled in slowly—even after trial had begun. In the evenings after court, we had to review new evidence and incorporate it into the next day’s witness examinations, which was highly unusual, and uniquely challenging.
The surprise evidence was worth it. It supported our story and caught the adverse witnesses off-guard.

When did you first know you wanted to be a trial lawyer? What clicked for you?

I was six months pregnant during my first trial (an arbitration, in fact). Everyone thought we were going to lose. My suits didn’t fit, and I was constantly exhausted. But the morning it was set to begin, I remember looking in the mirror and saying out loud to myself—I was made to do this. It felt true even though nothing looked perfect that day. I’ve known since then that this path I’m on can look messy and still be right.

Also—we ended up winning that case!

What are the major keys to winning over a jury or a judge?

Authenticity and preparation. Judges and jurors want to see and hear the real you, and they don’t want their time wasted. This means that you need to be fiercely polished in your trial presentation—every document and question is there for a reason and presented in a deliberate sequence. But you deploy it raw and vulnerable in your humanness and leave room for spontaneity. That’s how you deliver on both credibility and persuasion.

What’s the best advice a mentor lawyer or judge gave you about trial prep?
“If you’re not having fun, you’re not doing it right.”