Jessica Sallee

Jessica is a legal assistant that joined the firm in February of 2022.  Jessica is responsible for client intakes and is often the first point of contact for our potential clients. She is thankful to work for a firm who fights hard and loves people well.

Jessica grew up in Northwest Arkansas. She graduated from the University of Arkansas with a BA in Sociology and Criminology. Jessica enjoys traveling, has a heart for Missions and loves spending time with her dog Ramsey.

TV dramas inspired Jessica Sallee’s real-life career in law

After Jessica graduated from the University of Arkansas in 2020, her passion for people led her to pursue a career in full-time ministry. She has been on several short-term mission trips over the years, some in the United States and others to places like Haiti, the Dominican Republic, Lebanon, and multiple different countries in Africa. A big reason she obtained a degree in sociology was because it fed her interest in understanding people so she can “love them better”.  

She has always been a fan of the television drama Law & Order and shows of that nature. There are more than 500 episodes of the television drama Law & Order, and the number skyrockets into the thousands when you include the show’s six spinoffs like Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, Law & Order: Criminal Intent, and Law & Order: Los Angeles. Jessica figures she has seen roughly… well… all of them. 

In 2022, Jessica pivoted to a new plan that drew on her love of police dramas and allowed her to use her college degrees in sociology and criminology.

“It’s kind of cheesy, but I grew up watching Law & Order shows, and I realized how many jobs there are in the legal world that aren’t being a lawyer,” Jessica says. “So, I just started looking at different jobs, heard about one at the Oliver Law Firm, and I applied at the right time.”

Jessica joined the firm in 2022 as a legal assistant, and while the realities of her work seldom look like the fictionalized television show, the fit couldn’t be much better.

Jessica states that her eyes were opened when she began to work at Oliver Law Firm. “With our cases you are in it for the long haul, we spend months/years perfecting our clients’ cases to provide the best outcome possible”. This is in direct contrast to the television shows that air on TV “we watch a television show in 15-minute increments and the entire case is closed by the end of the hour”.  

While Jessica developed her interest in the investigative aspects of a career in law from watching television, her deepest passion has always been helping people. 

“Honestly, that’s why I love working here,” she says. “All of our attorneys and, really, the entire staff, love people so well and love them right where they’re at.”

Jessica is the firm’s intake specialist, which means she’s often the first person on the team who hears a potential client’s story and learns what event has taken place. 

“If someone thinks they have a case, they call and ask to speak to an attorney, I take them through some basic questions, get their contact information, and ask them to tell me what happened,” she says. “I get as much detail as I can, and then send all the information to the rest of the intake committee to look at and see if it’s something we can help them with.”

If not, Jessica will refer the person elsewhere, sometimes to another law firm that handles the type of case they might have or to a governmental or nonprofit service that might be able to offer them help.

“I get a lot of very difficult calls because it’s people who have gone through something traumatic,” Jessica says. “They’ve been hurt, injured or wronged in some way. Although challenging, I enjoy being able to use skills I’ve learned to effectively communicate and empathize with the potential clients.” 

Jessica handles five to 10 intake calls a week and says her training at the Oliver Law Firm along with her personal experiences and the training she’s had through the years in ministry environments has equipped her to sympathize and empathize with people during difficult conversations.

“Sometimes you can tell there’s a little bit of relief in their voice just from being able to tell their story to someone,” she says. “Even if it’s just giving them the number to the medical board where they can file a complaint, you can hear the relief. It doesn’t always fix it and I don’t always know what happens after we get off the phone, but I can sense that we were able to help them in one way or another.”

The cases that fit our “case acceptance criteria” become Oliver Law Firm clients, and then Jessica gets involved in work related to the actual case. She spends time helping with focus groups, for instance, or assisting with documentaries that involve video interviews with friends and family of a client.

“I love hearing how our client(s) have positively affected the people around them” she says. “The world is hard, but humans aren’t as bad as you think, you know? And it is my favorite thing. For instance, I went down to Russellville (Ark.) last summer and every single person we interviewed for this documentary said the most incredible things about the family we’re representing. It was so genuine.”

The work also gives her an opportunity to grow personally by learning from her coworkers, especially the attorneys as they work directly with clients and their friends and family.