Bankruptcy and mediation boutique Ross, Smith & Binford has added former U.S. Trustee trial attorney J. Casey Roy to its Austin office.
Roy, also formerly a Texas assistant attorney general, has three decades worth of experience as a commercial bankruptcy lawyer, with particular expertise in regulatory and healthcare matters. He and name partner Jason Binford previously worked together in the AG’s office.
“Casey possesses a truly unique breadth of expertise that will greatly benefit our clients,” Binford said in an announcement of Roy’s move. “We are thrilled to have him join us as he enters the next chapter of his career.”
Roy oversaw Chapter 11 and Chapter 7 bankruptcy proceedings in the Western District of Texas as a trial attorney in the U.S. Trustee program, and provided counsel in Chapter 11 healthcare cases filed in the Southern District of Texas.
During his 12 years at the AG’s office, Roy represented several state agencies on regulatory issues in bankruptcy including the Texas Health and Human Services Commission, the Texas Board of Medical Examiners and the Texas Department of Aging and Disability Services.
Roy worked with firm partner Frances Smith on a case in Fort Worth while representing the Health and Human Services agency, and described Smith as a “fantastic lawyer” in an interview with The Texas Lawbook. Joining Smith and Binford at the firm is “kind of full circle,” Roy said.
“I have always been impressed by the sophistication and precision of this firm’s attorneys, and as I looked toward a return to private practice, this opportunity was a natural fit,” Roy said in the announcement.
Roy obtained his law degree from the University of Houston Law Center. He has also worked for Sheinfeld, Maley & Kay, McClain & Patchin and in the Travis County Attorney’s Office.
Read more from Roy in the below Q&A with The Lawbook.
Why did you decide moving from the U.S. Trustee’s Office to Ross, Smith & Binford was best for your practice at this time?
In all honesty, I was not necessarily looking to make a move. I’ve known Jason Binford for several years. He and I practiced together and shared a wall for a couple of years at the Texas AG’s office, where I got to know him both professionally and personally. We became good friends and I have such a great deal of respect for Jason and for the way he practices law. It just kind of happened organically. We were visiting over lunch one day, and I don’t even know how the subject came up, but we started visiting about working together, and it just came about that way. The move was really a singular opportunity that I wasn’t necessarily seeking. And I’ve also been in cases involving Frances Smith in the past and just have a great deal of respect for her as well.
I think my expertise, particularly in healthcare cases but also just regulatory matters in general — oil and gas, environmental, things of that nature — makes the fit with the firm very good and provides space to develop that practice a little bit further.
How will your experience at the U.S. Trustee’s Office benefit the firm and its clients?
During my not-quite-three years at the U.S. Trustee’s office, I learned a heck of a lot more about kind of the pitfalls and pratfalls of the process that you don’t want to get yourself into, regarding basic things like deadlines in different types of cases, particularly the new rules and procedures regarding Subchapter 5 cases. So I think my exposure to a number of those cases has benefited my knowledge way more than if I was in private practice at the time and just had one or two cases because I saw what to do right.
Also, my overall experience has largely been in complex commercial Chapter 11 cases. And so seeing how consumer cases — kind of the nuts and bolts — I think was really valuable.
To expand on that, what skills did you hone that will translate into this new role?
One of the things that occurs in every complex, large Chapter 11 case is the filing of what are called first-day motions that essentially allow a debtor to continue to operate. Being able to dig in and spot issues in each type of those filings’ — be it a cash collateral or debtor in possession financing motion, and several others — enabled me to really spot the kinds of issues that may come up that need to be addressed at the outset.