Rich Ruohonen

Rich Ruohonen says it just happened. Raised by parents who told him never to give in and to win every argument, he heard often that he should be a lawyer, and a high school mock trial confirmed he liked the courtroom. He entered law school picturing contracts or work as a sports agent, but his first business law class was too boring for an outgoing person who wanted to help people directly. A two-and-a-half-year clerkship at a Minnesota personal injury firm sealed it, and he joined Pritzker and Associates in 1996.

Ruohonen is a world-level curler who became the oldest U.S. Winter Olympian at the 2026 Games, and he says the athlete’s discipline defines his practice: preparation. “People don’t practice,” he says. At TSR Injury Law he created Fight Club, where a lawyer delivers an opening to about 20 colleagues who offer only criticism, then revises and does it again. Before a $13 million verdict he gave his opening more than 10 times. He studies jury psychology, runs focus groups, frames language carefully and is willing to try arguments no one has attempted.

A 3-year-old boy who was beaten and raped at a daycare where he was left unwatched for more than an hour. The case arrived around 2009, took years to gauge the child’s future needs and required roughly 30 depositions. Told he would never top $1 million, Ruohonen won a $13 million verdict, only to have the trial court set it aside. He tried the case again and won another multimillion-dollar verdict. The boy, now 21, is thriving. The case led Ruohonen to cut his fees for children and testify for stronger daycare laws.

Ruohonen describes using his platform at the 2026 Winter Olympics. With people in Minnesota afraid to leave their homes amid ICE enforcement, his Minnesota teammates asked him, the veteran and the lawyer, to speak at the press conference before competition. He said the team loved playing for the flag but not what the country was representing in Minnesota, and that they played for people with empathy who care about the rule of law. Death threats followed, but he calls it one of his proudest moments. Lawyers, he says, have a duty to speak up.

Ruohonen is a partner at TSR Injury Law in Bloomington, Minnesota, where he has practiced since 2009, when the firm was Terry and Slane. He handles personal injury matters, including auto and semi-truck crashes, premises cases such as deck collapses and product liability, and he is one of Minnesota’s best-known lawyers for daycare abuse and injury cases, with about 15 pending at a time. Over nearly three decades he has tried roughly 90 cases, once trying 13 in about 19 months. The firm’s website is tsrinjurylaw.com.

Ruohonen earned his J.D. from Hamline University School of Law in 1996 and was admitted to the State Bar of Minnesota the same year. He joined Pritzker and Associates that November, became a partner and stayed about 13 years before moving in 2009 to the firm now known as TSR Injury Law. He is a past president of the Minnesota Association for Justice and a member of the Minnesota State Bar Association. He also played one year of Division III college tennis before committing to curling.

Ruohonen was named Minnesota Lawyer Attorney of the Year in 2024, an honor his profile says he has received six times, and Minnesota Association for Justice Member of the Year in 2011. He reports more than 25 consecutive trial wins. Results listed on his profile include a $12 million settlement for a leg amputation, a $4 million truck crash settlement for a dominant arm injury, a $3.75 million defective product settlement, a $2.1 million underinsured motorist verdict for a traumatic brain injury and a $1.1 million auto accident verdict.