Dallas attorneys Clayton Bailey and Alex Brauer, co-founders of Bailey Brauer, have been selected among the state’s top business litigators in the 2019 edition of the Texas Super Lawyers legal guide.

One of The National Trial Lawyers’ Top 100 Texas Civil Plaintiff Lawyers, Bailey has a national trial and appellate practice. He represents clients involved in complex tort and other commercial cases, corporate litigation and in putative class actions and mass action lawsuits in federal and state courts. A frequent author, he contributed to sections of the American Bar Association’s recently released Agriculture and Food Handbook. This is his ninth Texas Super Lawyers selection.

In a release, the firm said Brauer represents companies and high net worth individuals involved in high-stakes business litigation involving claims of fraud, tortious interference, breach of contract, breach of fiduciary duty, conspiracy, deceptive trade practices, trade secret theft, RICO, and antitrust violations. Brauer has successfully defended clients facing class and collective actions and represented plaintiffs and defendants in complex tort and negligence cases. The 2019 selection is the third for Brauer.

Texas Super Lawyers is published by Thomson Reuters, appearing in Texas Monthly and Super Lawyers magazines. Selection is limited to no more than 5 percent of Texas attorneys and is based on a statewide survey of lawyers and extensive editorial review.

Trial lawyer David Bissinger, a founder of Houston-based Bissinger, Oshman & Williams LLP, has been selected for an 11th consecutive year to the Texas Super Lawyers list.

Bissinger was recognized in the annual legal guide for his work involving complex commercial disputes. The honor is particularly significant, he said, because of Houston’s reputation, history, and culture of outstanding courtroom advocacy.

“Texas has some of the best trial lawyers in the world. It is an honor to be on this list,” he said.

Bissinger represents clients in energy and technology matters, securities and corporate fiduciary litigation, executive compensation, banking, and real estate. He has substantial first-chair jury trial and complex arbitration experience for both plaintiffs and defendants.

Earlier this year, he earned a jury verdict securing all the damages his client sought in a dispute with a commercial landlord. Also, in recent months, he has helped his clients win significant settlements in two large-scale international matters, one for a plaintiff in a wide-ranging trade secret case, and the other for the defendant in a multifaceted corporate dispute spanning three continents.

Beyond his work as an advocate, Bissinger has served as an arbitrator in multiple commercial disputes and has published articles on trial advocacy and substantive topics in commercial law.

A former chairman of the Houston Bar Association’s Securities Litigation and Arbitration Section, Bissinger is AV-rated “Preeminent” by Martindale-Hubbell, the organization’s highest peer rating for legal skills and ethics. He earned his law degree from Vanderbilt Law School, where he served as Editor in Chief of the Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law, and his undergraduate degree from the University of Iowa, where he was Phi Beta Kappa.

Texas Super Lawyers is published annually by Thomson Reuters in Texas Monthly and Super Lawyers magazines. Selection is based on a statewide survey of lawyers and extensive editorial review.

Freeborn & Peters LLP announced that Shelly A. DeRousse, a Chicago partner and co-leader of the firm’s Bankruptcy and Financial Restructuring Practice Group, is among the honorees of the 2019 Women, Influence & Power in Law (WIPL) Awards presented by Corporate Counsel and InsideCounsel magazines.

Formerly known as the National Women in Law Awards, the WIPL Awards honor general counsel, in-house leaders and law firm partners who have demonstrated a commitment to advancing the empowerment of women in law. According to Corporate Counsel and InsideCounsel, “These women are business strategists, complex problem-solvers, and of course, great lawyers. But what particularly makes these women stand out is their personal dedication to the promotion of diversity in the legal industry. These are women championing women.”

The honorees will be formally recognized at an awards dinner Oct. 16 as part of the Women, Influence & Power in Law Conference in Washington, D.C. Profiles of the honorees will be published in the December issue of Corporate Counsel magazine.

DeRousse is a restructuring attorney and commercial litigator and one of a handful of women in the United States to lead a bankruptcy and financial restructuring practice group at a law firm. DeRousse has experience representing official committees of unsecured creditors in middle market chapter 11 cases.

Since 2016, DeRousse has served as president of the Women’s Bar Foundation (WBF) of Illinois, a non‐profit organization that supports the advancement of women in the legal profession by raising money and awarding scholarships to women in each of the nine law schools in Illinois. During her tenure as president, the WBF has awarded hundreds of thousands of dollars in scholarships to women law students. She also has served on the WBF board for about 15 years.

In addition, DeRousse serves as co-chair of the Breakfast Program Committee and serves on the Network of Women Committee for the Turnaround Management Association for the Midwest Region. In this role, she plans and runs events designed to create connections among professionals in turnaround management. In 2018, she was elected as a Fellow of the American Bar Foundation and was one of six U.S. women finalists for the distinguished Chambers award for “Inspiring Role Model in Promoting Gender Diversity in the Legal Profession.” She has also been recognized by Crain’s Business Chicago on its lists of Notable Women Lawyers and Notable Gen X Leaders in Law.

At Freeborn, DeRousse is the partner chair of the firm’s Women’s Leadership Counsel, through which she organizes mentoring, educational and social programs and events for the women attorneys at the firm. She also supervises and mentors the women attorneys who belong to the Bankruptcy and Financial Restructuring Practice Group and advocates for women at the firm as a whole and for policies that support women. DeRousse’s Bankruptcy and Financial Restructuring team has the highest percentage of women of all of Freeborn’s practice groups.

DeRousse received her J.D. from DePaul University College of Law and her Bachelor of Science from Illinois State University.

BakerHostetler announced that Daniel A. Pepper, most recently a senior legal and privacy executive with Comcast, has joined as a partner in the firm’s Privacy and Data Protection team. He will work in the firm’s Philadelphia office.

At Comcast, Pepper concurrently served as a vice president, deputy general counsel and deputy privacy officer. He was responsible for developing comprehensive global privacy and data security programs to minimize risk and promote compliance with all applicable laws and regulations in the U.S. as well as internationally. This included reviewing potential problem areas across all business units and recommending solutions for compliance with policy and legal requirements.

Prior to Comcast, Pepper was assistant general counsel for information technology, information security, and global clearance and compliance at Verizon Communications, where he served as executive legal liaison for the company’s chief information security officer, chief technology officer and chief information officer. He also was founder and managing member of the Pepper Law Group, which provided outside counsel to numerous Fortune 500 and privately held companies, advising on information technology, security and data privacy, commercial transactions, intellectual property, internet law, digital marketing/advertising, corporate governance, strategic partnerships, and IT and business process outsourcing. Pepper also held legal counsel roles at BEA Systems and Oracle Corp.

Pepper received his B.A. from Rutgers College and his J.D. from the Duquesne University School of Law. He also completed the executive leadership program at Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth. Pepper holds the designation of Certified Information Privacy Professional (CIPP/US) from the International Association of Privacy Professionals (IAPP), where he is also a board member. Pepper is also member of the Rutgers University Big Data Advisory Board.

Miller & Chevalier Chartered announced that Paul A. Leder, former director of the Office of International Affairs (OIA) at the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), joined the firm as an of counsel in the Litigation Department.

In a release, the firm said Leder Leder led the SEC’s international enforcement and regulatory program, where he worked with senior government officials in the U.S. and throughout the world. He collaborated with foreign regulators, particularly those in Latin America, in cross-border investigations, and provided policy advice to foreign governments and organizations regarding compliance with the FCPA and other anti-bribery laws. Leder also represented the SEC in international organizations, including the International Organization of Securities Commissions (IOSCO) and the Financial Stability Board.

Prior to his latest role at the SEC, Leder was a partner at Richards Kibbe & Orbe LLP where he represented clients in government investigations and advised on laws and regulations associated with international regulatory issues. Before that, Leder spent more than a decade at the SEC, starting as a trial lawyer in the Division of Enforcement in 1987, joining the Trial Unit soon after the SEC received penalty authority and co-counseling the SEC’s first jury trial. When the OIA was established two years later, Leder joined the leadership team, first serving as assistant director and later as deputy director. From 1997 to 1999, he served as senior adviser for international issues to SEC Chairman Arthur Levitt.

Leder began his legal career as a trial lawyer at the Public Defender Service (PDS) for the District of Columbia where he tried more than 25 jury trials. He is the seventh former PDS lawyer at Miller & Chevalier, including Litigation Department Chair Andrew Wise.

Leder earned his J.D., cum laude, from the University of Michigan Law School, and his B.A., magna cum laude, from the University of Michigan. He is currently a Senior Fellow in the Milken Global Market Development Practice.

Hughes Hubbard & Reed LLP announced that Nicolas Tollet has been elected a partner in the firm’s Anti-Corruption & Internal Investigations practice.

The firm said He joined the firm as counsel in December 2016 from Technip, where he served as vice president of group compliance, and was based in Paris and Rio de Janeiro. Tollet’s practice focuses on internal investigations and compliance, with particular focus on anticorruption and anti-money laundering.

Tollet has experience in compliance, including navigating monitorships, conducting internal and external investigations, establishing compliance programs and conducting third-party due diligence, the firm said. He has experience with anti-corruption and anti-money laundering legislations and has worked on several of the largest transnational corruption cases in the world.

Tollet is involved in the international compliance community. He regularly publishes articles on compliance, speaks at international conferences, and lectures on anti-corruption. In 2017, he was among 37 professionals selected by Global Investigations Review as the leading in-house professionals worldwide for internal investigations, and he is ranked Tier 1 by Legal 500 and identified as a Next Generation Lawyer.

He is admitted to practice in New York, Paris and the U.S. Supreme Court.

Linc Finkenberg has joined Perkins Coie’s Financial Transactions practice and Fintech industry group as a partner in the New York office. Finkenberg joins Perkins Coie from BNY Mellon, where he served as associate general counsel and managing director and led a global team of more than 30 lawyers and 100 transaction managers.

In a release, the firm said Finkenberg most recently served as BNY Mellon’s global practice head for Corporate Trust, where he advised on significant financial deals including the transition of a global bank’s government securities clearing business. He managed BNY Mellon’s legal teams, supervising depositary receipts, treasury, broker-dealer services and government clearing services, and was also integral to high-profile litigation and risk mitigation restructuring, as well as leading the formation and acquisition of overseas trust banks across Latin America, Europe and Asia.

Finkenberg received his J.D. from the New York University School of Law and his B.S. in accounting and finance from Baruch College (City University of New York).

SmartAsset has published the results of a study designed to rank states from best to worst to practice law.

Criteria include the number of lawyers per 1,000 workers, average annual income, five-year earnings and job growth, median home value and the percentage of law offices relative to total establishments.

Illinois tops the list, with Idaho and Maine tied at the bottom. Delaware and North Dakota were excluded because of insufficient data.

In 2018, Illinois lawyers earned an average of $152,980, according to the study. The average for Idaho was $99,360.

Read the SmartAsset article.

Katlyn E. DeBoer and Zachary K. Iacovino have joined Freeborn & Peters LLP’s Chicago office as associates in the Litigation and Corporate practice groups, respectively.

A member of Freeborn’s Complex Litigation Team, DeBoer has experience drafting substantive motions and pleadings, developing case strategy, engaging in large-scale discovery, taking depositions, and preparing for trial, the firm said in a release.

Prior to joining Freeborn, DeBoer was an associate at Winston & Strawn LLP, where she represented clients in complex civil litigation and white-collar matters, including trade secrets and civil racketeering actions. Previously, she served as a judicial clerk for Judge John E. Jones III in the Middle District of Pennsylvania.

DeBoer received her J.D. (summa cum laude) from Chicago-Kent College of Law and her Bachelor of Arts from the University of Iowa.

A member of Freeborn’s Private Equity and Venture Capital Industry Group, Iacovino focuses his practice on mergers and acquisitions, private equity transactions, commercial contracts, and general corporate and organizational matters. He represents buyers and sellers in asset acquisitions and divestitures, take-private stock acquisitions, cross-border transactions, equity investments and joint ventures, financing and lending transactions, and corporate restructuring, among other matters.

Prior to joining Freeborn, Iacovino was an associate at Cheng Cohen LLC.

Iacovino received his J.D. from Loyola University Chicago School of Law and his Bachelor of Arts from the University of Tampa.

Highly regarded as a Litigation Powerhouse®, Freeborn has a Big Law-caliber reputation in litigation, with nationwide and international capabilities and one of the largest litigation departments among Chicago-based law firms – currently with more than 90 litigators. Many of Freeborn’s litigators are former federal and state prosecutors with decades of trial experience handling all areas of complex disputes and litigation in federal and state courts.

Saxe Doernberger & Vita, P.C. announced that associate Janie Reilly Eddy has joined the firm’s SDV Northeast office.

The firm said Edd7y has a background in litigation, handling matters from inception through resolution and advising and guiding clients through viable litigation options. Her experience includes discovery and motion practice as well as settlement negotiations, mediations, arbitrations and trials.

Jon C. Yonemitsu has joined Littler as a shareholder in its San Diego office. He joins Littler from Gordon Rees Scully Mansukhani, LLP. Yonemitsu’s arrival follows the return of shareholder Liseanne Kelly, who rejoined Littler earlier this year.

The firm said Yonemitsu counsels and defends companies in a wide range of employment law matters, including discrimination, harassment and retaliation claims under Title VII, the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Family Medical Leave Act, California’s Fair Employment and Housing Act, and the California Family Rights Act. He has experience representing clients in single and multi-plaintiff employment litigation, wage and hour class and collective action litigation, and Private Attorneys General Act claims, as well as before federal and state administrative agencies.

In addition to his litigation practice, Yonemitsu counsels employers on federal and state compliance matters, including in relation to hiring and termination, wage and hour issues, employee handbooks, workplace trainings, data security and restrictive covenants.

Before entering private practice, Yonemitsu served as deputy district attorney at the Contra Costa District Attorney’s Office. He earned his J.D. from California Western School of Law and his B.A. from Oregon State University.

Derek Zaba has joined Sidley Austin LLP as a partner in the firm’s global M&A and Private Equity group and co-leader of the shareholder activism practice.

Zaba is joining Sidley in Northern California from PJT Camberview Partners, a leading provider of investor-led advice to public companies.

The firm said Zaba will focus his practice on counseling boards and C-suite executives of public companies in shareholder activism matters and contested M&A transactions, as well as on corporate governance concerns.

Zaba joined Camberview in 2015 and ultimately served as the head of its activism and contested M&A practice. At Camberview, he advised clients on activism-related matters. Previously, Zaba was an investment professional at two hedge funds. He started his legal career as a corporate attorney at Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz.

Alex Purvis, a partner in Bradley Arant Boult Cummings LLP’s Jackson, Miss., office, has been accepted as a Fellow in the American College of Coverage Counsel (ACCC).

In a release, the firm said the ACCC engages in a rigorous vetting process prior to inviting a lawyer to become a Fellow. Its Fellows include many of the most prominent members of the insurance law bar.

A member of Bradley’s Litigation and Insurance practice groups, Purvis is a litigator and policyholder coverage lawyer whose background includes experience in product liability, construction and complex commercial litigation.

The firm said the ACCC is the preeminent association of U.S. and Canadian lawyers who represent the interests of insurers and policyholders. The ACCC focuses on educating all sectors involved in the field of insurance law – including the judiciary, legal and insurance professionals, law students, and businesses – on cutting edge, emerging and critical issues such as developing trends in insurance law and bad faith, trial practice and alternative dispute resolution, policy formation, and claims handling.

Five attorneys with personal injury and commercial litigation firm Sommerman, McCaffity, Quesada & Geisler have earned selection to the 2020 edition of The Best Lawyers in America.

Sean McCaffity made the Best Lawyers list for the first time based on his work in bankruptcy and creditor-debtor rights as well as insolvency and reorganization law. Andrew B. Sommerman, George (Tex) Quesada, Laura Benitez Geisler and Al Ellis, of counsel, earned honors for their personal injury litigation work for plaintiffs. Mr. Sommerman earned additional recognition for his work in commercial litigation.

The Best Lawyers in America annual legal guide selects leading lawyers in various practice areas based on peer evaluations submitted by lawyers nationwide. The complete 2020 Best Lawyers in America edition is available online at http://bestlawyers.com.

The Dallas-based firm works in personal injury and commercial litigation, with attorneys having earned professional honors from notable legal industry ranking services, such as Texas Super Lawyers and Best Law Firms. The legal team has more than 100 years of combined legal experience, the firm said in a release.

Three Provost Umphrey attorneys have been named Lawyer of the Year for their respective practice groups and geographic region as part of the Best Lawyers in America 2020 honors.

Equity partner Bryan O. Blevins Jr. earned this distinction for his work with mass tort litigation and class actions on behalf of plaintiffs, with additional honors for plaintiffs’ personal injury and product liability litigation. Equity partner David P. Wilson also earned Lawyer of the Year honors for his work in personal injury litigation with plaintiffs. Attorney Darren L. Brown received Lawyer of the Year recognition for plaintiffs’ product liability litigation, with additional recognition for plaintiffs’ personal injury litigation. The attorneys are based in Beaumont, Texas.

For a fifth consecutive year, all of Provost Umphrey’s equity partners earned placement to the Best Lawyers in America listing. Edward Fisher, Joe J. Fisher II, D’Juana Parks, and James E. Payne received honors for their work with plaintiffs in personal injury litigation and product liability litigation. Joe Fisher earned additional recognition for his mass tort and class actions litigation work on behalf of plaintiffs.

Additional Provost Umphrey attorneys honored by Best Lawyers in 2020 for their plaintiffs’ litigation work include:

Guy G. Fisher: Product Liability
W. Michael Hamilton: Labor and Employment
J. Keith Hyde: Personal injury and Product Liability
Christopher T. Kirchmer: Mass torts, Class Actions, Personal Injury and Product Liability
Matthew C. Matheny: Mass Torts, Class Actions and Personal Injury
Colin D. Moore: Personal Injury and Product Liability
Ronnie Turner Jr.: Personal Injury and Product Liability

The firm also received special recognition in the “Top-Listed Awards” for having more recognized lawyers than any other firm in Texas in plaintiffs’ personal injury litigation, product liability litigation and mass tort litigation/class actions.

The Best Lawyers in America is recognized as one of the leading guides to the U.S. legal profession. Surveys from tens of thousands of attorneys nationwide are used to compile the rankings of the nation’s top lawyers in various practice areas.

Insurance coverage and litigation attorney Meloney Perry has earned a place in the 2020 edition of The Best Lawyers in America for her work in insurance law and insurance litigation.

The nation’s oldest peer-review guide has recognized the Dallas attorney and founder of Perry Law P.C. for a second consecutive year. Perry is an insurance lawyer who serves as the primary regional attorney for a major national insurance carrier. She also represents companies involved in insurance and business disputes throughout Texas, New Mexico and Colorado.

Perry is a frequent presenter at legal seminars that focus on insurance coverage, bad faith matters and the law and has taken a leadership role within the State Bar of Texas. She is the immediate past vice chair of the Council of Chairs Committee and is a former chair of the Insurance Law Section.

The Best Lawyers in America is a legal guide developed through a process of independent nominations followed with voting by current Best Lawyers honorees in the same practice areas and geographic regions. Editors make the final selection after careful review.

Thirteen lawyers with Texas-based family law firm Orsinger, Nelson, Downing & Anderson, LLP, earned selection to the 2020 edition of Best Lawyers in America, the nation’s oldest peer-review guide to the legal profession.

Name partners Richard R. Orsinger, Keith M. Nelson, R. Scott Downing and Jeff O. Anderson were recognized for their work in family law. Orsinger also earned honors for his appellate work. Anderson earned additional recognition for his family law arbitration practice.

Also earning family law recognition are partners William M. Reppeto III, Brad M. LaMorgese, Amber Liddell Alwais, Paula A. Bennett, Lon M. Loveless, Paul Hewett, Chris Oldner, Holly Rampy Baird, and of counsel James M. Loveless. LaMorgese earned additional honors for his appellate practice, and Bennett also was recognized for her family law mediation work.

Foley & Lardner announced that Jamie Class has joined the firm’s Business Law Department and Finance Practice Group as a partner in its Boston office.

In a release, the firm said Class has more than 20 years’ experience representing U.S. and global clients as issuers of and investors in debt instruments in a wide variety of debt financing and restructuring transactions. She works with clients in a range of industries, including financial services, real estate investment, life sciences, high-tech, emerging energy technology, health care, retail and manufacturing.

The firm said Class has worked with multiple parties to close syndicated secured and unsecured credit facilities, private placements and public offerings of securities, second lien notes, tender offers, exchange offers, consent solicitations, project finance transactions, tax-exempt bond financings, acquisition financings, venture debt and convertible notes, and mezzanine financings. In addition to traditional finance, Class has derivative/swap experience, and more general note purchase agreement and private placement lending experience.

In the past year alone, Class has helped close transactions totaling in excess of $10 billion. Her experience includes representing a publicly traded company in securing committed financing for an acquisition through the issuance of credit agreement debt and a tranche of notes. Class has also represented a client in the purchase and sale of royalty interests, has closed several rounds of senior, junior and mezzanine investments, and has advised clients on London Interbank Offered Rate (LIBOR) transition matters and debt agreement provisions.

Class joined Foley from Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr LLP in Boston, where she was a member of the Corporate Practice Group. She received her BA from Hampshire College and her JD from Harvard Law School, from which she graduated cum laude.

Mark Yacura has joined Michael Best’s Washington, D.C. office as partner and will focus his practice FDA Regulatory matters. Previously, Yacura was a partner at Quarles & Brady LLP.

In a release, the firm said Yacura provides counsel and representation to his clients on a wide breadth of Food and Drug Administration (FDA)-related matters in connection with synthetic pharmaceuticals, biotechnology, diagnostics, medical devices, conventional foods, dietary supplements, and cosmetics. He regularly advises clients on the FDA approval and clearance process, regulatory compliance and enforcement issues, labeling, manufacturing and advertising claims and substantiation, due diligence, securities filings, collaboration licensing, and supply and clinical trial agreements, among other related matters.

In addition to his extensive work with the FDA, Yacura also handles matters before several other administrative agencies. This includes the Consumer Product Safety Commission, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Federal Trade Commission, and the National Advertising Division of the Better Business Bureau.

Yacura earned his J.D., cum laude, from the American University Washington College of Law, his M.B.A. from the University of Pittsburgh, and his B.S. in Pharmacy from Duquesne University.

Bradley Arant Boult Cummings LLP announced that Michael M. Aphibal has joined the firm’s Washington office as an associate in the Banking and Financial Services Practice Group.

The firm said Aphibal advises clients on regulatory issues affecting financial institutions, including banks, non-bank lenders, and insurance agencies. His work focuses on concerns surrounding the offering of consumer financial products and services, including licensing, employee compensation, loan origination and servicing, customer information sharing and privacy, consumer disclosures, telemarketing, and the sale of add-on products, particularly debt protection products. Aphibal is also experienced with insurance regulatory issues affecting producers, including insurance agency and broker licensing, producer compensation and associated disclosures, commission splitting and referral fees, anti-rebating, insurance advertising, and permitted charges for insurance, the firm said.

Prior to joining Bradley, Aphibal was an attorney at McIntyre & Lemon, PLLC.

Aphibal received his J.D. (cum laude) from American University, Washington College of Law and his Master of Laws (with distinction) in securities and financial regulation from Georgetown University Law Center. He also holds a Bachelor of Arts from Colgate University.