William “Bill” Pedersen III has joined Cantey Hanger as a partner in Dallas.
Pedersen joins the firm from Dallas litigation boutique Carter Arnett, where he handled complex commercial litigation and trial work. At Cantey Hanger, he will represent clients in litigation and appellate matters across a broad range of disputes, according to a firm announcement on LinkedIn.
Before joining Cantey Hanger, Pedersen practiced for nearly two years Carter Arnett, where he was a part of the trial team that secured a $9.2 million patent infringement verdict in federal court. He previously served a six-year term as a justice on the Fifth Court of Appeals in Dallas after being elected in 2018. Earlier in his career, Pedersen spent more than 15 years in private practice at his own firm after leaving the Collin County Criminal District Attorney’s Office, where he began as a line prosecutor and later led the Domestic Violence Unit.
During his time on the appellate court, Pedersen authored about 400 opinions. It did not take him long to tell The Texas Lawbook‘s Michelle Casady which was his favorite in an interview last year. He pointed to a dissent he authored in a criminal case, Marlon Lall v. State of Texas. Lall was convicted of manufacturing or delivering methamphetamine but argued on appeal some evidence used to convict him should have been suppressed, and other evidence was insufficient.
The other two justices on the panel affirmed the trial court’s judgment. But Pedersen wrote, “no Texas Court should consider refusal to waive one’s civil liberties, in this case to consent to a search, as a factor supporting reasonable suspicion.” The Court of Criminal Appeals agreed with that analysis and partially quoted Pedersen in its March 2024 opinion. Pedersen said to Casady at the time, “It’s hard not to be pleased when you disagree, and the higher court saw it the way that I saw it.”
He earned his law degree from the Baylor University in 2001 and his undergraduate degree from Texas Tech University in 1998.