© 2015 The Texas Lawbook.
By Mark Curriden
(March 31) – Two prominent Dallas business litigation boutiques – Gruber Hurst Johansen Hail Shank and Elrod – are expected to announce Wednesday that they are merging their law practices.
The combined law firm will boast 30 lawyers, making it one of the largest commercial litigation-only law firms in the Dallas-Fort Worth area.
Partners at Gruber Hurst, which represents companies such as Pappas Brothers, Texas Capital Bank, Mary Kay and Highland Capital, said the addition of acclaimed energy trial lawyer David Elrod and the four other lawyers in his firm gives their Dallas office a depth that can handle even the largest and most complex business disputes.
Lawyers at both firms say their merger comes at a strategic time because they expect to see an increase in contract and commercial litigation in the oil and gas sector because of the falling oil prices.
“We now have as many, if not more, trial lawyers as most large corporate law firm litigation sections in Dallas,” said Mark Shank, a partner at Gruber Hurst. “David and his team give our firm the horsepower and expertise in energy litigation to tackle any major dispute.”
Shank and other Gruber Hurst partners say that Elrod, who is actively representing about a dozen major oil and gas companies in separate lawsuits and arbitrations underway in eight states, is also an ideal cultural fit for their firm.
“We’ve dated and danced and talked about this merger for about two years,” Gruber Hurst partner Michael Hurst said. “Law firm partnerships are a delicate balance of Type-A personalities and you have to ask each time you add a new partner whether this person will make the law firm or could the lawyer be a destructive force.
“We don’t invite lawyers into our partnership unless we want to go have drinks with him or her regularly,” said Hurst, who successfully represented Hunt Consolidated and Ray Hunt last year in its fraud trial against Honeywell International. “David is a great lawyer and a great guy and we concluded that he is a perfect addition for us.”
Elrod, who represents both traditional upstream and midstream oil and gas corporations and alternative energy companies, said that he, too, has turned down multiple offers to join other law firms because he didn’t think they were ideal matches for him and his team.
“I’m at the wedding chapel waiting for someone to speak up and object, but it is a perfect marriage because we add to each other’s strengths so much,” he said. “There’s a lot of horsepower in this new law firm. We can do a lot more with 30 lawyers than we could with just five.”
Gruber Hurst was founded in 2006 when Dallas trial lawyers Mike Gruber and Don Godwin went their separate ways.
“This is a move that makes sense for both our firms, bringing together attorneys with similar styles that reflect an aggressive and efficient approach in trying cases,” Gruber said.
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