West Texas Trial Lawyers, PLLC

Focus and practice areas

West Texas Trial Lawyers, PLLC handles two kinds of work: criminal defense and personal injury. The criminal side covers assault and domestic violence, drug crimes, DUI and DWI, sex crimes, violent crimes, white collar crimes, and property crimes. Federal crimes, homicide, felonies, misdemeanors, and criminal immigration matters appear on the list too.

The injury work is narrower. The firm takes car accidents, truck accidents, and slip and fall claims.

The firm also names specific services within a criminal case: bond hearings and jail release, grand jury defense, pre-trial litigation, appeals, and expungement. That list tells a reader something useful. It covers the earliest hours of a case, the middle stretch, and what happens after a conviction or a dismissal.

What those stages usually involve

General context helps here. A bond hearing happens fast, often within days of an arrest, and a judge sets conditions of release. Grand jury proceedings in Texas run in secret, and the panel decides whether a felony charge moves forward as an indictment. Pre-trial litigation is where motions get filed: motions to suppress evidence, motions about what a jury may hear, challenges to how a search or a stop was conducted.

Expungement is a separate proceeding altogether. It asks a court to erase records of an arrest or charge that did not end in conviction. Appeals move to a different court with a written record and briefing rather than live testimony. Each of these has its own clock and its own paperwork, which is why firms tend to list them separately.

The two attorneys and their backgrounds

The firm was formed by combining the practices of Adam Setra and Salah George Alhanna. Both worked as prosecutors before moving to defense.

Adam Setra practices criminal defense in Texas and takes both state and federal cases. His listed work includes pre-trial litigation, discovery audits, and constitutional challenges. He has been selected to Super Lawyers. In my opinion, the mention of discovery audits is the more telling detail of the three. It points at reviewing what the state actually turned over, and whether anything is missing, which is unglamorous work that shapes outcomes.

Salah George Alhanna has practiced law in Texas since 1999. He was born and raised in El Paso and did his undergraduate degree at the University of Texas at El Paso, then earned his law degree from Southern Methodist University. He spent seven years as a criminal prosecutor. He holds a Martindale-Hubbell Distinguished peer-review rating, a peer-reviewed mark based on ratings from other lawyers and judges.

Neither attorney is given a formal title on the site. There are no partner or associate labels, and no bar admission years are stated.

What the firm says about its record

Two figures appear on the about page. The firm says it has handled over 7,000 cases and has over 30 years of combined courtroom experience.

Those are the firm's own numbers, and a reader should treat them that way. The combined figure lines up with what the attorney biographies show, since Alhanna's practice alone dates to 1999 and includes seven years on the prosecution side. The case count is a volume claim rather than an outcome claim. It says nothing about results, and the firm does not attach results to it.

As a reviewer, I find the absence of published case results worth noting plainly. Texas advertising rules make outcome claims risky for firms, and plenty of well-run offices skip them entirely. What the site offers instead is background: two prosecutors who changed sides, one peer-review rating, one Super Lawyers selection.

Geography and who the firm reaches

The main office is in El Paso. A second office is in San Antonio. Between them the firm covers a long stretch of the state, and the site says it represents clients across West Texas, including Midland and Odessa and surrounding communities.

That geography matters for criminal work. El Paso sits on the border, and criminal immigration matters appear on the practice list, which fits the location. Midland and Odessa sit in the Permian Basin, roughly 280 miles east of El Paso, in a different set of county courts. San Antonio adds a third region and a different federal district.

The firm works in both state and federal courts. Federal criminal practice in Texas runs through separate districts with their own procedures, and the Western District of Texas covers El Paso, Midland, and San Antonio alike. A firm with offices at two ends of that district is positioned for it.

Access and language

The site says consultations carry no cost, that the firm is available 24 hours a day and 7 days a week, and that Spanish is spoken. Round the clock availability is a practical claim for criminal defense. Arrests happen at night and on weekends, and the window before a first appearance is short.

Spanish language service in El Paso is a functional necessity given the city's population. A client explaining the facts of an arrest in a second language loses detail, and detail is what a defense is built from.

How a criminal matter generally reaches a firm like this one

In most Texas criminal cases, the first contact comes from a family member rather than the arrested person. Magistration happens within 48 hours of arrest, and bond gets set there. Counsel who appears early can argue conditions of release, which affects whether someone waits for trial at home or in custody. The charging decision follows: a prosecutor may file directly on a misdemeanor, while a felony goes to a grand jury.

From there a case sits in a pre-trial posture for months. Discovery arrives in batches under Texas's discovery statute, motions get filed and heard, and negotiations run alongside. Most cases resolve before a jury is picked. The ones that go to trial are the reason firms describe courtroom experience in years.

Reading this listing

West Texas Trial Lawyers gives a reader the things that can be checked. Two named attorneys with named schools, named prior roles, and named credentials. A defined list of charges and case types. Two office locations and a stated service area.

The site holds back on other things. It does not state a founding year, and it assigns no titles to either attorney. Bar admission dates are absent, and Setra's law school is not named.

For someone comparing El Paso criminal defense options, the useful facts here are the prosecutorial backgrounds and the breadth of the criminal list. Fourteen years as a prosecutor sits behind the two biographies combined, seven of them stated explicitly for Alhanna. That experience shapes how a defense lawyer reads a file, because they know how the other side builds one. The firm has handled criminal matters in Texas state and federal courts, and it publishes the names of the people who do the work.