Jim graduated from the University of Illinois, Urbana – Champaign. He personally paid for his entire undergraduate education by way of unskilled labor jobs, including work as a janitor, busboy, grocery store clerk, doorman (through the SEIU), freight handler, dockworker, house painter and security guard. Jim then obtained his law degree from DePaul University in 1978, attending school first as a day student and then, after his first year, switching to night school. Despite switching to night school, Jim finished law school in three years. He personally paid for his entire legal education by working as a writer and then later as an editor for a public interest group which had a pro-law enforcement, pro-victims of crime mission. After graduating from law school, Jim worked for Attorney Jim Demos, a highly respected trial lawyer.

 

Jim left the Demos firm and started the firm which later became Costello, Gilbreth & Murphy in June 1983 as a solo practice. He entered into a "soft retirement" in June, 2025, now handling only pro bono cases and a very select group of other cases. Jim also acts as personal counsel for physicians and others who are being sued where their insurers are not acting in good faith. Jim has tried a number of cases in Cook County as well as in Tennessee, Texas and Iowa. Many of those cases have involved neurological injuries or Wrongful Death. Among his verdicts is a case which set the record, at the time, as the largest police pursuit verdict at the time in the State of Illinois. Jim also tried a Wrongful Death case which was litigated in Wisconsin and then tried in Illinois a Wrongful Death case on behalf of a member of the Executive Council from Local 399. Jim also successfully prosecuted and then handled the appeal in the case of Lopez v. _____ Law Offices, a legal malpractice case/Wrongful Death case against another Chicago law firm which had provided incorrect advice to one of our clients. That advice resulted in the dismissal of a case the client brought on behalf of his mentally challenged daughter, who drowned in a swimming pool. Through our firm’s efforts, the parents were able to find out what actions / inactions contributed to their daughter’s death and to hold accountable the law firm which had provided the family with incorrect advice.

 

For over forty-five years, Jim has engaged in extensive pro bono efforts, some privately and others while working with various legal service groups. Many of the private cases involved both medical and legal issues. In the early years, most of these cases involved people who had been denied coverage by their insurance carriers for bone marrow transplants or related issues. In the last fifteen years, Jim has worked extensively with the Chicago Volunteer Legal Services. The original CVLS group met at Visitation Parish, located in Englewood. Both of Jim’s grandmothers graduated from that parish’s grade school. Jim has also been involved with the St. Sabina’s Law Ministry, the CBA Judicial Evaluation Committee, and the Finance Committee at St. Viator High School.

 

In addition to handling appeals for the firm, since 1979, Jim has written or contributed to many appellate briefs in the Illinois Supreme Court and the U.S. Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals as amicus curiae on behalf of other plaintiffs. His most recent effort was filed on behalf of the membership of the Chicago Federal of Labor.

 

Jim and his wife, Kate, live in Arlington Heights. They are the proud parents and grandparents of four sons, five grandsons, and one grandprincess. Their oldest son was elected as a Circuit Court judge in 2024; their other three sons comprise Costello Financial Planning, a fee-only financial services firm.