Cory Keith

Cory Keith founded Desert Legal Group with a specific idea about how family law should be practiced: keep the caseloads small enough that an attorney has time to move cases forward and genuinely know them. Cory serves as the firm’s Founder and Managing Attorney.

Most people who call a family lawyer are not shopping for legal services. They are trying to find out whether they will keep seeing their children, whether they can afford to leave, or what happens to the house they spent a decade paying for. Cory built the firm around that reality. Clients get an attorney who has read the file, who answers the call, and who can explain in plain terms what is likely to happen next and why.

Cory manages the firm and meets with its attorneys every month to go through all of the firm’s cases. That is why he keeps his own caseload deliberately small. A client who retains Desert Legal Group is not getting a single lawyer’s judgment; the strategy in every matter has been through him, and usually through the rest of the firm’s attorneys as well. He still carries his own cases, which keeps him in the courtroom rather than only in the conference room, and keeps his judgment current on how Maricopa County judges are deciding cases.

He concentrates on the matters where the stakes and the complexity are highest: contested legal decision-making and parenting time, cases involving substantial or hard-to-value assets, and matters where privacy and reputation are part of what the client is protecting. His clients have included athletes, public figures, and high-net-worth individuals.

His work covers the full range of Arizona family and juvenile law. That includes divorce and legal separation, legal decision-making and parenting time, child support, spousal maintenance, division of property and debt, prenuptial and postnuptial agreements, relocation, modification and enforcement of existing orders, orders of protection and injunctions against harassment, grandparent and other third-party rights, adoption, and dependency, severance, and Department of Child Safety proceedings. Cory also serves as general counsel for corporations, advising companies on their ongoing legal needs, and he takes personal injury matters as well.

Cory grew up in Phoenix and has practiced here his entire career. He attended both Arizona State University and law school on full-ride academic scholarships, earning his Bachelor of Science in criminal justice and criminology, with a minor in psychology, in 2016, graduating cum laude. He received his Juris Doctor in 2018 and was admitted to the State Bar of Arizona on May 22, 2019.

He began his career in criminal defense, and that grounding still shows in how he handles cases. Attorneys who come out of criminal work tend to be comfortable with cross-examination, with contested evidentiary hearings, and with the reality that a case may genuinely be tried rather than settled. He moved his practice to family law and spent years in contested litigation before founding Desert Legal Group.

Cory also teaches other attorneys. He presents continuing legal education on integrating modern technology and artificial intelligence into the legal field, a subject where the profession is moving quickly and the practical guidance has not caught up. Cory integrates these practices into his firm to maximize the level of representation Desert Legal Group provides its clients.

Super Lawyers has selected him to its Rising Stars list every year from 2022 through 2026. The American Institute of Family Law Attorneys named him among its 10 Best in family law. He has also been recognized as a Top 10 Family Law Attorney by Best of the Best Attorneys and by Attorney and Practice Magazine, and named a Lawyer of Distinction. Avvo gave him its Client’s Choice award, and he holds a 5.0 rating there from client reviews.

Outside the practice, Cory volunteers with Arizona Stealing Hearts Rescue, a large-breed dog rescue.