Free Speech, Due Process and Trial by Jury
When the Covid-19 pandemic struck, PREMIUM CONTENT Vistra Energy, like nearly every company during the pandemic, sent their employees home to work remotely. At the same time one of their new hires, Yuki Whitmire was moving with her family into a new house. What happened over the next year proved remarkable, and in a special Q&A, Yuki spoke with Mark Curriden about what she learned from the experience.
Ashley Yen was in kindergarten when she drew a picture of herself in the future: a stick figure of herself in a suit and glasses holding a briefcase, “I’ve always wanted to be a lawyer,” said Yen, who is associate in-house counsel and assistant vice president at Methodist Health System. She is one of the youngest and arguably the most important in-house counsel in North Texas in the battle against the Covid-19 pandemic. Because of Yen, Methodist was one of the first hospitals in DFW to administer the vaccine.
Premium Subscriber Content From the day the Center for Disease Control issued its initial coronavirus warning for U.S. hospitals, Methodist Health System need to lean on its youngest vice president. Ashley Yen and her legal team responded, answering and engaging the plethora of legal issues and regulatory procedures critical to dealing with a global pandemic. Mark Curriden had the opportunity to discuss those challenges and a variety of other issues in a special Q&A.
American Airlines GC Priya Aiyar may be the smartest lawyer in corporate America. So say lawyers and executives who watched her in action during the pandemic. She clerked for Judge Merrick Garland and Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer. She's been the GC of the U.S. Treasury and a chief legal advisor at the FCC. Every bit of those smarts were needed to address the plethora of legal issues American faced during the past year.
“Priya has no ceiling,” AA Executive VP Stephen Johnson said. “If she remains in the airline industry, the industry will experience a revolution in operations and Priya will be a key reason for that evolution. She is unlike any other lawyer who has ever worked in the airline industry.”PREMIUM ONLY Priya Aiyar is general counsel at American Airlines. Like many in-house counsel she was tested by the pandemic in ways that seemed unfathomable when she took the job i 2019. But her performance at the legendary air carrier has brought praise from all quarters in the business world.
Mark Curriden, founder of The Texas Lawbook, talked to her at length about the obstacles she faced and the challenges still ahead of her. Here is a portion of that conversation.At 35, Ricky Torlincasi is one of the youngest GCs in the oil patch. He’s been on the job at Blackbeard Operating less than two years, but he's already helped integrate three mergers, led the acquisitions of Anadarko Basin assets from BP and ConocoPhillips’ legacy Waddell Ranch, and the divestitures of assets in Oklahoma and South Texas. Then there's the litigation he's handled.
Torlincasi's successes have him as a finalist for the 2020 DFW Outstanding Corporate Counsel’s Rookie of the Year Award.Ricky Torlincasi has seen a lot in less than 20 months as general counsel of Blackbeard Operating. Mark Curriden, founder of The Texas Lawbook had a chance to talk with Torlincasi at length about what he's learned about himself, what he likes about in-house legal work and what he looks for in outside counsel.
Imagine a law practice in which you serviced tens of thousands of real estate transactions annually and oversaw the litigation in thousands of cases a year. Welcome to the world of Fannie Mae Deputy GC Todd Barton and his team, who provide legal support for all properties in the U.S. that are acquired by Fannie Mae in foreclosure. How does he do it? The answer rests in the fact that Barton is the recipient of the 2020 DFW Outstanding Corporate Counsel Award for Innovation. The Texas Lawbook has his story.
FOR PREMIUM SUBSCRIBERS
Todd Barton is Deputy GC of Fannie Mae. His legal department Fannie Mae handles thousands of real estate transactions annually. As a result, important decisions come fast and furious with consequences that extend far beyond the daily grind. How does he do it? How did he learn to do it? The Lawbook's Mark Curriden had a chance to ask him.No corporate in-house counsel saw her or his world turned upside down any faster or more severely because of the Covid-19 pandemic than CEC Entertainment CLO Rudy Rodriguez. The 741 Chuck E. Cheese and Peter Piper restaurants in 47 states were shut down within days last March, thousands of workers were furloughed and then came bankruptcy.
The situation required extraordinary legal work, strong leadership and a tender heart. Rodriguez provided it. CEC survived and is poised to thrive. And Rodriguez, as a result, is a finalist for the 2020 DFW Outstanding Corporate Counsel Award for General Counsel of the Year for a Small Legal Department. This is his story.For Premium Subscribers No corporate in-house counsel saw her or his world turned upside down any faster or more severely because of the Covid-19 pandemic than CEC Entertainment CLO Rudy Rodriguez. The 600 Chuck E. Cheese and Peter Piper restaurants in 47 states were shut down within days last March, thousands of workers were furloughed and then came bankruptcy.
Toyota Managing Counsel Meyling Ly Ortiz has won a major wage and hour class action lawsuit, developed and implemented cutting-edge programs to address bias in the workplace and played a huge role in guiding the world's largest carmaker through Covid-19 restrictions. But Ly Ortiz is a finalist for the 2020 DFW Outstanding Corporate Counsel Award for Pro Bono and Public Service for one reason: she has a servant's heart, which she attributes to extraordinary decisions her parents made 7,800 miles away four decades ago.
For Premium Subscribers Only Meyling Ly Ortiz is managing counsel for labor and employment law for Toyota North America. Mark Curriden, founder of ,em>The Texas Lawbook had the chance to ask her about her philosophy regarding pro bono and its importance in considering outside counsel.
Tasha Grinnell started at Neiman Marcus exactly one year ago. Days after she started, the Covid-19 pandemic hit. Stores needed to be closed and some employees furloughed. Two months later, the luxury department store filed for bankruptcy - a brutal and costly process that Grinnell and her predecessor Tracy Preston conquered. "We had a lot of balls in the air, and we still do," Grinnell, who became Neiman Marcus' interim GC on Friday, told The Texas Lawbook in an exclusive interview.
For a quarter of a century, Leanne Oliver has been a corporate in-house lawyer for PepsiCo and Frito-Lay. She has been a groundbreaker in developing family leave policies and internal training efforts to eliminate sexual harassment. She’s also a highly successful labor and employment lawyer.
American Airlines and Chuck E. Cheese. Farmer Brothers and HMS Holdings. Southwest Airlines and Aventiv. The CLOs and GCs at these six North Texas companies utilized their legal acumen and business leadership skills to lead their employers through a monumentally challenging year. They are finalists for the 2020 DFW Outstanding Corporate Counsel Awards.
For any industry, what goes up must come down. We see this in the airline industry on a minute-by-minute basis as planes take off and land as scheduled. In 2020, COVID-19 brought radical and immediate changes to businesses and their legal departments. Like airlines, the key is to agree on a flight plan and bring everyone in for a soft landing.
Financial services giant Charles Schwab, which just relocated its HQ on Jan.1, is expected to announce next week that it is hiring former Securities and Exchange Commission regional director and former federal prosecutor Shamoil Shipchandler as its new chief counsel.
Houston-based Marathon Oil has chosen Kimberly Warnica, the former general counsel at Alta Mesa Resources, to replace Reginald Hedgebeth as its new general counsel.
Westlake-based Goosehead Insurance terminated the employment Thursday of its assistant GC, Paul Davis, who posted a video on Instagram Wednesday that appears to show himself inside the Capitol building as part of the Trump protest that turned into a riot. Davis, who posted several social media messages claiming the elections were a fraud, said Thursday that he was "fired for exercising my First Amendment rights."
© Copyright 2025 The Texas Lawbook
The content on this website is protected under federal Copyright laws. Any use without the consent of The Texas Lawbook is prohibited.
