Bracewell and V&E Advise in $3 Billion Kinder Morgan Purchase

© 2015 The Texas Lawbook.By Natalie Posgate (Jan. 22) – Houston-based Kinder Morgan, Inc. has agreed to purchase oil billionaire Harold Hamm’s midstream company, Enid, Okla.-based Hiland Partners, for $3 billion. The acquisition will give Kinder Morgan significant access to the Bakken Formation, where Hiland owns crude oil pipelines and gas gathering and processing systems.For Hamm, the money provides some padding after his controversial divorce with ex-wife Sue Ann Arnall, which cost the Continental Resources CEO nearly $1 billion, as well as the decline of his overall fortune, which Forbes reports is currently half its original size due to plummeting crude oil prices. Kinder Morgan General Counsel David DeVeau turned to Houston corporate partners Cleland “Cle Dade and Greg Bopp of Bracewell & Giuliani to lead the transaction for Kinder Morgan. The remainder of the primarily Houston-based Bracewell deal team included partners Jason Jean, Stuart Zisman, Heather Brown, Aaron Roffwarg, Scott Sanders and Timothy Wilkins; associates Elizabeth Behncke, Mona Cannon, Kate Champion and Jessica Edwards; and associates from the firm’s New York, Seattle and Washington, D.C. offices. In addition to DeVeau, the Kinder Morgan in-house deal team included deputy GCs Adam Forman and J. Curtis Moffatt and assistant GCs Angela…