Charles Specavek

Senior Partner

Chuck has over 40 years of experience litigating complex commercial cases, with particular emphasis on the trial and appeal of insurance coverage disputes, including breach of contract, declaratory judgment and bad faith actions. Chuck has served as a national coordinating coverage counsel for several of his clients, including on matters involving environmental losses, cyber-liability, TPCA claims and, most recently, COVID-19 claims. He has shared his expertise on insurance issues in testimony before the Minnesota Legislature. Chuck has served on the Board of Directors of The Purdue Alumni Association, Center of the American Experiment, and the Ridgeview Hospital Foundation.

Chuck was named in 2025, 2021, and 2016 by The Best Lawyers in America as its Minneapolis Mass Tort Litigation/Class Action – Defendants “Lawyer of the Year.” He was also named as its 2019 and 2014 Minneapolis Insurance Law “Lawyer of the Year.” He has twice been recognized by Minnesota Lawyer as an “Attorney of the Year,” in 2013 and in 2006. He was chosen as one of Minnesota’s 10 best appellate lawyers and has been recognized since 1994 as a Minnesota Super Lawyer, earning Top 100 distinction in fifteen of those years. Since 2013, he has been identified by Chambers USA as one of America’s Leading Litigation Lawyers for Business.

Chuck is one of 788 insurance lawyers and seventy Barristers from forty-four countries recognized in Lexology Index: Insurance. Additionally, Chuck has been included in its Thought Leaders: USA report for his expertise in advising on significant matters in insurance and reinsurance. In 2021 Minnesota Lawyer and Minnesota Finance & Commerce named Chuck a “Minnesota ICON.”

Representative clients include American Financial Group, Argo Group US, BNSF Railway Company, Brown & Brown, Inc., Certain Underwriters at Lloyds of London, Chubb Limited, Curi Insurance, Everest Global Services, Inc., Federated Mutual Group, Great American Insurance Group, Intact Insurance Specialist Solutions, James River Group, Knight Insurance Group, Riverstone Claims Management Services, Inc., SOMPO Holdings, Inc., and The Travelers Companies, Inc.

Chuck’s experience includes work on several major cases whose decisions have been cited as significant precedent in over 300 published opinions and scholarly papers.

• Charter Member, Insurance Litigation Institute of America
• Fellow, American College of Coverage Counsel
• Fellow, American Bar Foundation
• Emeritus Fellow, Litigation Counsel of America
• Past Board of Directors and Past-Chair, Ridgeview Hospital Foundation
• Past Board of Directors and Past-Chair, Center of the American Experiment
• Past Board of Directors, The Purdue Alumni Association

Chuck earned his Juris Doctor from Indiana University Robert H. McKinney School of Law in 1980.

Chuck graduated from Purdue University with a Bachelor of Science in Economics degree in 1977.