As Gary Kennedy packed up his office, he discussed his 30 years at American and 11 years as chief legal officer. He talked about spending $500,000 a day on lawyer fees for the past two years as he led the airline through a bankruptcy reorganization that will be recorded as the most successful Chapter 11 in history. He engineered a $17 billion merger with US Airways and battled and then settled a major antitrust lawsuit with the federal government.

In an exclusive interview with The Texas Lawbook, Kennedy shares his experiences with outside counsel, the in-house legal department he’s leaving behind and his plans for the future. By all accounts, Kennedy is one of the most respected chief legal officers in the country.

“I fell in love with the airline business,” he says. “It’s a very sexy industry. There is something about transporting people around the globe in a metal (or these days a composite) tube at 35,000 feet thousands of times a day, that just gets in your blood.”

Next Monday, before the financial markets open, lawyers for American Airlines and US Airways will gather in the Dallas offices of Weil, Gotshal & Manges on the second floor of the Crescent Court to sign the “closing papers” officially merging the two companies and creating the world’s largest airline. The closing, which will be more ceremonial than substantive, ends one of the most complex, expensive and successful corporate bankruptcies in U.S. history. This is the inside story of how the airlines settled the Justice Department’s lawsuit to block the merger – a lawsuit that the airlines, the federal government and nearly all legal experts said couldn’t be settled.

The General Counsel Forum paid tribute this week to the professional successes of Texas’ chief legal officers. The 700 corporate GCs who make up the organization gave Frost National Bank Stanley McCormick. Jr. its Magna Stella Lifetime Achievement Award. CEVA Chief Legal Officer Dana O’Brien was honored with the Forum’s Large Corporate Legal Department of the Year, while Paul J. Malak, the general counsel at Mitsubishi Caterpillar Forklift, received the same honor for a small corporate legal department. The Texas Lawbook profiles all of the award winners.

The General Counsel Forum paid tribute this week to the professional successes of Texas’ chief legal officers. The 700 corporate GCs who make up the organization gave Frost National Bank Stanley McCormick. Jr. its Magna Stella Lifetime Achievement Award. CEVA Chief Legal Officer Dana O’Brien was honored with the Forum’s Large Corporate Legal Department of the Year, while Paul J. Malak, the general counsel at Mitsubishi Caterpillar Forklift, received the same honor for a small corporate legal department. The Texas Lawbook profiles all of the award winners.

American Airlines GC Gary Kennedy says he was shocked and disappointed that Texas AG Greg Abbott joined the federal antitrust lawsuit filed last week to stop AA’s $11 billion merger with US Airways. Kennedy says “no concerns were voiced in advance” by Abbott’s legal team. Kennedy says the airline has “no contingency plan” if the merger fails and that the company is “focusing all of our efforts and energies on winning this lawsuit.” Meanwhile, the airline is spending about $500,000 a day in legal expenses.

Last week, a federal judge dismissed the $3 billion World Trade Center attack lawsuit against American Airlines. “The horrible attacks on September 11 were terrible for our country and, truthfully, could have been disastrous for our airline,” says Koorenny, an associate GC at American. “Those were my colleagues we lost that day and the lawsuits against us only added insult to our injuries by trying to blame us for the attacks.” For a dozen years, the WTC cases have been Koorenny’s life, but 10,000 hours or so later, the end of the litigation may be in sight.

General counsels have traditionally used their outside law firms as recruiting pools – not law schools. But that is changing.

Alan Schoenbaum is fed up with patent trolls and he’s not going to take it any more. The San Antonio tech GC vows to fight the patent assertion entities.

Alan Schoenbaum is fed up with patent trolls and he’s not going to take it any more. The San Antonio tech GC vows to fight the patent assertion entities.

Long-time AA General Counsel Gary Kennedy is leaving after nearly three decades working in the airlines’ corporate legal department. AA CEO-in-waiting Doug Parker announced that his current executive vice president for corporate and government affairs at US Airways Group, Steve Johnson, will oversee the company’s legal and regulatory affairs.