About Keeley D
Keeley D Heath earned her law degree from Western Michigan University Cooley Law School, receiving her J.D. in 2005. She arrived at law school after undergraduate studies and finished in the mid-2000s. The legal training at Cooley Law laid the groundwork for a career that moved quickly from classroom to courtroom.
She joined Blanchard Law in 2005 and over time took on leadership responsibilities there. Her title at the firm is partner and managing attorney. In that role she has handled a range of criminal matters and overseen other attorneys in the office. Her work at the firm has been the constant thread of her professional life since she began practicing.
Heath’s courtroom approach has been shaped in part by her connection to the Gerry Spence Trial Lawyers College. She is a graduate of the college’s F-Warrior program and later joined its faculty in 2016. Teaching trial skills to other lawyers has become an extension of her practice. It has also kept her engaged with techniques and strategies for jury trials and courtroom advocacy.
Her professional associations reflect steady involvement in the criminal-law bar. She has served on the board of the Criminal Defense Lawyers of Michigan since 2008. She has been a member of the Michigan Association for Justice since 2012 and has maintained membership in the State Bar of Michigan’s Criminal Law Section since 2005. Locally, she has been active in the Ionia-Montcalm Bar Association and served as its president; she remains involved with that group.
Colleagues and students describe Heath as a lawyer who prepares meticulously and values the give-and-take of trial practice. She balances case preparation with courtroom time, and she spends part of her calendar teaching at trial-college programs. Her certification as an F-Warrior graduate is one indicator of that dual role as practitioner and instructor.
Over nearly two decades in practice she has focused on criminal defense work, representing clients in state courts and handling cases that require contested hearings and jury trials. She is based at Blanchard Law, where she continues to manage cases and mentor younger lawyers.
She currently concentrates her practice on criminal defense and trial litigation.
