Albert Lowes remembered as a legendary litigator

Cape Girardeau attorney Albert C. Lowes, described by friends and colleagues as a tenacious, cigar-smoking jurist whose gruff exterior cloaked a heart of gold, died Monday night at a long-term care facility in Cape Girardeau.

A resident of Jackson, Lowes had recently been hospitalized in St. Louis before transferring to the Cape Girardeau nursing facility last week for rehabilitation. He was 87 years old.

“Albert was a lawyer in a time when we had monumental litigators in Southeast Missouri,” said Jackson attorney Tom Ludwig. “You had people like Don Thomasson, Don Dickerson, Jim Spain and other tremendous lawyers, Albert was one of those pillars.”

Ludwig was a recent law school graduate when he joined Lowes’ law practice in 1977.

“From the first day I met him, I learned things at a phenomenal rate,” he said. “I learned more sitting beside him in trials than I learned in three years of law school. It was like drinking out of a fire hose.”

Ludwig said he could “talk for hours” about Lowes. “He was a major influence on me,” he said. “He would tell me, ‘You get in there and stand up for your client, no matter what, and if you need me, I’ll come and bail you out.’”

Cape Girardeau attorney and former Mayor Albert M. Spradling III remembers his first encounter with Lowes in 1976 when they tried a civil case in Perry County.

“He was the first lawyer I ever tried a jury trial against,” he said. “And that’s when he gave me the nickname ‘3 A.M.’”, in reference to his first and middle initials.

Over the years, Spradling said he grew to admire Lowes for his character and work ethic.

“He was a one-of-a-kind person and would do anything for you if you asked for it,” he said.

“Albert was an excellent lawyer and a good friend,” Spradling continued. “I learned a lot from him just watching how prepared he always was; he would never be unprepared for any type of matter, whether it was a court appearance, a deposition or anything else.”

Lowes grew up on a farm just north of Oak Ridge. According to a 2001 feature about him published in the Southeast Missourian, he was guided by a motto for living his father gave him, his brother and two sisters: “Play hard, but work hard first.”

He joined the Marine Corps two weeks after graduating from high school in Perryville, Missouri, and by 1952 was in Korea working as a stenographer for a pair of two-star generals. He left the Marines after four years as a staff sergeant, convinced he should study law. According to the Missourian’s 2001 story about him, Lowes decided he could be a lawyer after watching attorneys in military court marshals.

“The way some of those fellows slop around, I figured I could do that,” he was quoted in the article.

Lowes graduated from the University of Missouri-Columbia with a law degree in 1959 and came back to Cape Girardeau County to his law practice. It was at the University of Missouri where he met the former Peggy Watson. They were married in 1960. He retired in 2015 and she died in 2016, meaning both their marriage and his legal career lasted 56 years.

In 1984, Lowes partnered with attorney Sam Drusch formed the Lowes and Drush law firm. They practiced together more than 30 years before both retired.

“Albert was a legend,” said Dick Steele, who practiced law in Cape Girardeau more than 50 years before retiring himself earlier this year. “He worked hard, he lived hard and he always kept his word, which is really important for a lawyer. If Albert said he was going to do something, by golly he did it.”

Lowes, Steele said, will long be remembered for his courtroom persona.

“Some of the stories about his closing arguments will live on for decades,” he said.

Over the years, Lowes was the lead defense attorney in a number of memorable criminal cases.

Among them was the 1994 murder trial of Joshua Kezer of Kankakee, Illinois, who was found guilty in the 1992 death of Angela Mischelle Lawless. Kezer was sentenced to 60 years in prison. Long after the trial, Lowes remained convinced of his client’s innocence and in 2009 Kezer was exonerated after new evidence came to light.

In 1987, Lowes defended Ellington, Missouri, banker Ron Mathes who was charged by federal authorities with being the “mastermind” in a Southeast Missouri arson ring. Mathes faced more than a dozen counts, including arson, conspiracy and mail fraud. The trial in federal court lasted several weeks before the jury acquitted Mathes of all counts.

Those who were in the courtroom at the time remember Mathes crying with relief when the verdict was read. Lowes cried, too.

“I saw the guy stand there in court and cry with his client when the verdict came down,” said Cape Girardeau attorney Pat Davis.

“He helped a lot of young lawyers out and was always willing to sit down and talk about cases,” Davis said. “He’d watch young lawyers in court and ask questions afterward, questions like, ‘Why did you do this?’ or he’d suggest another way to do something. I went out on my own in 1992 and he was always available for a phone call, because when you’re (practicing) on your own, you’ve got no one to ask, but he’d always help out.”

Michael Maguire was a recent law school graduate when he was hired by Lowes and Drush as an associate attorney in the mid-1980s. Asked how he would characterize Lowes, Maguire said, “He was one of a kind,” adding “he was a poster boy for political incorrectness.”

On a more serious note, Maguire described Lowes as “a mentor” and as “somebody whose word was his bond, somebody you could rely on.”

Although many perceived Lowes to be a hard-nosed attorney, Maguire said he “had the heart of a puppy inside” and remembers how Lowes was the first in line to pay his respects to him and his wife when the Maguires’ son died in 2009.

“Albert is with Peggy now,” Maguire said. “That’s the most important thing now.”

Funeral arrangements for Lowes are pending at Ford and Sons Funeral Home.