[4] After graduation from Midlothian High School, Adams attended the Virginia Military Institute (VMI) and became executive officer of the VMII Corps of Cadets.
[5] After commissioning out of VMI as an ensign in the U.S. Navy, Adams served two tours of duty, from 1996 to 2000, including deployment to Iraq during the decade-long Operation Southern Watch.
Among his cases, Adams prosecuted John W. Forbes, a former state finance secretary who pleaded guilty and in late 2010 was sentenced to serve 10 years in prison for diverting about $4 million of a $5 million grant from the state Tobacco Indemnification and Community Revitalization Commission (which had intended to improve literacy in Southside Virginia and southwestern Virginia) to shell companies he controlled and his personal benefit.
[8] In 2010 Adams joined McGuire Woods as a partner, and has conducted a private legal practice there since, other than his leave of absence during his Attorney General run.
He heads the firm's government investigations and white-collar litigation department and co-chairs the appellate team, where according to the Richmond Times-Dispatch, most of his cases have concerned matters in states other than Virginia.
[4][9] His elder brother Theodore F. "Tray" Adams III works for McGuire Woods Consulting as senior vice president of state government relations.
In 2013, Adams led the successful defense of a bank executive in a ten-week jury trial brought by the Department of Justice, while four other defendants were convicted.
In 2014, representing 15 members of Congress, Adams filed an amicus brief concerning the law's contraception mandate, which the Supreme Court ultimately struck down in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc.