The Prompt Payment of Claims Act is a statute ostensibly enacted to provide enforcement mechanisms for Texas businesses, among others, and their lawyers in transactions between insurance companies and their policyholders. But significant changes in the potential penalties for failing to timely investigate and pay policy benefits have been favorable to foreign insurance companies and harmful to Texas businesses.
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‘Nobody Gave Us a Chance’ — Lynn Pinker Turns 30
Mike Lynn left the comforts of national corporate firm Akin Gump in 1993 to start a trial-focused shop with two other lawyers. They used a wooden door on cement blocks as a desk. The paralegal was also the office manager, who worked at a table in the hallway. Thirty years later, Lynn Pinker is one of the largest and most prominent litigation boutiques in Texas, boasting 47 lawyers and blue-chip clients such as IBM, Energy Transfer, Neiman Marcus and Xerox — and even a Saudi prince. In three decades, the firm’s lawyers have scored multiple nine-digit courtroom victories for plaintiffs and defendants.
“This is a story that could only happen in Texas,” said Lynn, who is now 73. The stories of nearly all law firms are defined by critical or business-threatening events, enormous courtroom victories, lawyers joining and leaving and strategic decisions on practice groups or business sector focuses. Almost all successful firms in Texas have stories that revolve around one or two legal stars — be they Leon Jaworski or Steve Susman, John Zavitsanos or David Beck, Mike McKool or Paul Yetter. Lynn Pinker is no exception.
Litigation Roundup: Baylor Wins Licensing Dispute, Louisiana Bar Admonished by 5th Circuit for Speech
In this edition of Litigation Roundup, the Austin appellate court rejects Texas’ bid to cut two qui tam whistleblowers out of their share of a $236 million settlement with Xerox, the Fifth Circuit finds Tesla’s uniform policy does not run afoul of the National Labor Relations Act and two Dallas pain doctors are indicted in a $12 million fraud scheme.
New Texas Solicitor General Inherits Platform to Change Federal Law and Policies
BYU law professor Aaron Nielson is a renowned scholar and “a key member of the conservative legal movement” with expertise litigating against alleged regulatory overreach by federal authorities, according to lawyers and academics familiar with his work and even those who have battled him in court. The new Texas solicitor is an expert on the Administrative Procedure Act, a 1946 law that governs how federal agencies develop and implement regulations and a statute that Paxton has repeatedly used to challenge the authority of federal agencies. But in this article, The Texas Lawbook examines Nielson’s work on a 2020 U.S. Supreme Court case in which he was appointed by the justices to, ironically, brief and argue in favor of the constitutionality of the Federal Housing Finance Agency’s structure — a position that legal experts agree his boss, Texas AG Ken Paxton and other anti-federal agency advocates opposed. Nielson’s arguments won the day.
Jury Awards Ex-Houston Firefighter $250K in Nude Video Lawsuit
Melinda Abbt was awarded about $130,000 in mental anguish and exemplary damages and about $120,000 in attorney fees Thursday by a Harris County jury that agreed her former direct supervisor at the Houston Fire Department had unlawfully shared an intimate video of her with a fellow firefighter in 2007. Abbt didn’t find out about the disclosure until 2017 and filed suit the next year. She was unable to return to work after learning the video she made for her husband had been circulated.
The Corner Office: Q&A with Trey Cox
In this new thought leadership series, Dallas legal recruiter Kate Cassidy talks with Gibson Dunn’s Trey Cox about litigation trends in Texas, career advice for young attorneys, what he’s reading right now and more.
P.S. — Pro Bono Honor Roll, Civility in the Paxton Trial & More Accolades
This edition of P.S. features a new bank that joined a program that finances civil legal services in Texas through IOLTA accounts, a firm that recently became Mansfield 6.0 certified, recent awards received by Texas law students and law schools and law school staff and faculty for their dedication to pro bono, two lifetime achievement awards, a Texas firm’s recognition for its veteran pro bono work and an ABOTA civil and ethics-oriented award given to a special prosecutor in the Ken Paxton impeachment trial.
UPDATE – CDT M&A Lead Law Firms: Kirkland, Latham, V&E, Sidley, Gibson Dunn (As of Oct. 31)
The Texas Lawbook’s exclusive Corporate Deal Tracker lists the law firms whose Texas lawyers were lead counsel in M&A transactions for the buyers, sellers and targets between Jan. 1 and Oct. 31 this year. Sixteen of them led 10 deals or more, six were lead counsel on 25 or more transactions, two firms led 50 or more deals and one firm’s Texas lawyers have been lead counsel on more than 100 M&A transactions during the first 10 months of 2023.
CDT Law Firm Rankings 2023 (as of Oct. 31)
Texas lawyers for Kirkland & Ellis officially crossed the 100-deal count threshold and the $100 billion deal value mark in October, according to exclusive new Texas Lawbook Corporate Deal Tracker