Thomas M. Hayes III is the recipient of the 2025 Louisiana Bar Foundation’s (LBF) Curtis R. Boisfontaine Trial Advocacy Award. Mr. Hayes received the award in recognition of his long-standing devotion to and excellence in trial practice and for upholding the standards of ethics and consideration for the court, litigants, and all counsel. This award carries a cash stipend to any non-profit law related program providing services in the state of Louisiana; Mr. Hayes has selected the Northeast Louisiana Bar Foundation’s Pro Bono Project to receive the $1,000 stipend to be donated in his name.
He obtained a B.A. with honors from the University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee. He obtained his Juris Doctorate from Paul M. Hebert Law Center at Louisiana State University. He practiced until 2023 with Hayes, Harkey, Smith & Cascio in Monroe, Louisiana, primarily in representation of civil litigants in state and federal courts.
A council member of the Louisiana State Law Institute for over twenty-five years, he currently serves as Chairperson and Immediate Past President, and holds membership on several of the Institute’s committees, including the Louisiana Civil Procedure Committee. In 2022 and 2023, he served as Chairperson of a Legislative Task Force on Statewide Standards for Clerks of Court Electronic Filing and Records Retention. A two-term member of the LSBA Board of Governors, he has also served as Bar Examiner on the Louisiana Supreme Court’s Committee on Bar Admissions, where for several years he wrote and supervised grading of the examination on Federal Jurisdiction and Procedure.
He is a Fellow and Former Regent of the American College of Trial Lawyers, a Fellow of the International Academy of Trial Lawyers, and in the past held membership in several specialty bar associations related to trial work. He is past president of several local organizations, including the Fourth Judicial District Bar Association, the Fred J. Fudickar Jr. American Inn of Court, the Lotus Club and the Bayou DeSiard Country Club.
He was honored as Distinguished Attorney by the Louisiana Bar Foundation in 2016, and for Distinguished Achievement by LSU Law in 2018.
In 2015, after training as a mediator at the Straus Institute for Dispute Resolution at Pepperdine School of Law, he began working as a mediator through The Patterson Resolution Group. Since 2023, he has worked exclusively as mediator and arbitrator.
Tom and his wife, Karen, have been married for 48 years. They have four children, two of whom are attorneys, and six grandchildren.
The award was established through an endowment to the LBF in memory of Mr. Boisfontaine, who served as president of the LSBA and of the Louisiana Association of Defense Counsel. Donations from Sessions, Fishman, Nathan & Israel, L.L.P., the Boisfontaine family, and friends established the fund.
Photo Caption: Pictured L-R, 2025 Curtis R. Boisfontaine Trial Advocacy recipient Tom Hayes and LBF 2025-26 President Edmund Giering. (Photo by Matthew Hinton)
