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Mark Curriden

Mark Curriden is a lawyer/journalist and founder of The Texas Lawbook.

Mark Curriden

Mark Curriden is a lawyer/journalist and founder of The Texas Lawbook. In addition, he is a contributing legal correspondent for The Houston Chronicle and the Dallas Business Journal.

Mark is the author of the best selling book Contempt of Court: A Turn-of-the-Century Lynching That Launched a Hundred Years of Federalism. The book received the American Bar Association’s Silver Gavel Award and numerous other honors. He also is a frequent lecturer at bar associations, law firm retreats, judicial conferences and other events. His CLE presentations have been approved for ethics credit in nearly every state.

From 1988 to 1994, Mark was the legal affairs writer for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, where he covered the Georgia Supreme Court and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. He authored a three-part series of articles that exposed rampant use of drug dealers and criminals turned paid informants by local and federal law enforcement authorities, which led to Congressional oversight hearings. A related series of articles by Mark contributed to a wrongly convicted death row inmate being freed.

The Dallas Morning News made Mark its national legal affairs writer in 1996. For more than six years, Mark wrote extensively about the tobacco litigation, alleged price-fixing in the pharmaceutical industry, the Exxon Valdez litigation, and more than 25 cases before the Supreme Court of the United States. Mark also authored a highly-acclaimed 16-part series on the future of the American jury system. As part of his extensive coverage of the tobacco litigation, Mark unearthed confidential documents and evidence showing that the then Texas Attorney General, Dan Morales, had made a secret deal with a long-time lawyer and friend in which the friend would have profited hundreds of millions of dollars from the tobacco settlement. As a direct result of Mark’s articles, the U.S. Department of Justice opened a criminal investigation, which led to the indictment and conviction of Mr. Morales.

For the past 25 years, Mark has been a senior contributing writer for the ABA Journal, which is the nation’s largest legal publication. His articles have been on the cover of the magazine more than a dozen times. He has received scores of honors for his legal writing, including the American Bar Association’s Silver Gavel Award, the American Judicature Society’s Toni House Award, the American Trial Lawyer’s Amicus Award, and the Chicago Press Club’s Headliner Award. Twice, in 2001 and 2005, the American Board of Trial Advocates named Mark its “Journalist of the Year.”

From 2002 to 2010, Mark was the senior communications counsel at Vinson & Elkins, a 750-lawyer global law firm.

Mark’s book, Contempt of Court, tells the story of Ed Johnson, a young black man from Chattanooga, Tenn., in 1906. Johnson was falsely accused of rape, railroaded through the criminal justice system, found guilty and sentenced to death – all in three weeks. Two African-American lawyers stepped forward to represent Johnson on appeal. In doing so, they filed one of the first federal habeas petitions ever attempted in a state criminal case. The lawyers convinced the Supreme Court of the United States to stay Johnson’s execution. But before they could have him released, a lynch mob, aided by the sheriff and his deputies, lynched Johnson. Angered, the Supreme Court ordered the arrest of the sheriff and leaders of the mob, charging them with contempt of the Supreme Court. It is the only time in U.S. history that the Supreme Court conducted a criminal trial.

You can reach Mark at mark.curriden@texaslawbook.net or 214.232.6783.

Justice Wainwright Joins Bracewell, But Eyes Future AG Race

Texas Supreme Court Justice Dale Wainwright is returning to private practice in October but don’t expect the jurist, known for his strong political skills, to remain out of the limelight long. In an interview with The Texas Lawbook, Wainwright said he is thinking about running for attorney general in 2014 if Greg Abbott decides to run for lieutenant governor or governor.

Court Hears ‘Common-Sense’ Arguments on Business Tax Fairness

A plain reading of the Texas Constitution’s requirement that taxes be “equal and uniform” should sound the death knell for the state’s revised franchise tax, a lawyer for food and beverage giant Nestle USA told the Texas Supreme Court.

Not so fast, said the state’s lawyer. The Texas Legislature has authority to pick winners and losers by distinguishing among classifications of businesses.

Managing a Crisis: Oil Spill Case Tests Sutherland’s Rachel Clingman

Hired by rig owner Transocean just days after the deadly Deepwater Horizon explosion, Rachel Giesber Clingman approached the case with her trademark relentless preparation. Her early work proved critical, as she faced a maze of complex litigation, Congressional hearings and the challenge of leading a team of independent trial lawyers.

For Clingman, the case she is reluctant to discuss is the high point of a 20-year career, showcasing, and at times testing, the skills that have propelled her from a small Texas Hill Country town to her current position, at age 45, as the go-to defender of energy companies in trouble.

Managing a Crisis: Oil Spill Case Tests Sutherland’s Rachel ClingmanX

HOUSTON – Hired by rig owner Transocean just days after the deadly Deepwater Horizon explosion, Rachel Giesber Clingman approached the case with her trademark relentless preparation. Her early work proved critical, as she faced a maze of complex litigation, Congressional hearings and the challenge of leading a team of independent trial lawyers.

For Clingman, the case she is reluctant to discuss is the high point of a 20-year career, showcasing, and at times testing, the skills that have propelled her from a small Texas Hill Country town to her current position, at age 45, as the go-to defender of energy companies in trouble.

Longview Energy Wins $500 Million Land Transfer in Eagle Ford Case

For a small oil and gas company like Dallas-based Longview Energy, the chance to obtain a lease in the red-hot Eagle Ford Shale was an opportunity that doesn’t come along every day. So it was a huge disappointment in 2010 when a promising lease of 46,000 acres was rejected by two of the company’s directors, representatives of The Huff Energy Fund, a New Jersey private equity company that owns 39 percent of Longview.

What Longview did not know is that three days earlier, the very same land had been secured by a portfolio group that was 99 percent owned by the equity fund. Now, a South Texas judge has awarded Longview Energy the rights to the land valued at more than $500 million. It is one of the largest judgments ever involving the Eagle Ford play.

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