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Matt Orwig Says Goodbye to the Billable Hour

After 17 years with the U.S. Department of Justice and 20 years as a trial lawyer and white-collar criminal defense lawyer with some of the largest corporate law firms in the world, Matt Orwig officially retires from the law practice Monday. From federal judges to corporate general counsel, lawyers tell The Texas Lawbook the impact Orwig had on their career.

“In addition to being a skilled advocate, he was a wonderful teacher, mentor, and colleague who always made time to answer my questions and to strategize about cases,” Judge Irma Ramirez, who was recently confirmed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, said. “Matt is a genuinely kind person who cares about everyone around him, and he is the kind of friend on whom you can always count.”

ACC-DFW and The Texas Lawbook Celebrate In-House Corporate Counsel Award Winners

Nearly 250 prominent general counsel, senior corporate counsel and partners at Texas law firms gathered Thursday night at the George W. Bush Institute to celebrate the 2023 DFW Corporate Counsel Awards, which recognizes extraordinary work and success of in-house counsel during the past year. Co-hosted by the Association of Corporate Counsel’s DFW Chapter and The Texas Lawbook, 15 corporate in-house legal departments were honored and 12 were presented with awards. More than half of the finalists were women and more than one-fourth were ethnic minorities — all demonstrated incredible achievements during 2023. The DFW Corporate Counsel Awards is the signature event in the partnership between ACC-DFW and The Texas Lawbook. The two organizations also co-host CLEs throughout the year. Three of the dozen award categories were contested. In each of the three categories, all of the finalists were qualified to win. But, of course, only one could. This story includes the details and lots of photos from the event.

P.S. — Charity Fair, New AABA of Houston Leadership, Final Days of DBA’s EAJ Campaign

This week’s edition of P.S. includes information on a Munck Wilson Mandala shareholder who has been elected to the alumni board of TSU’s Thurgood Marshall School of Law, February dates for the Dallas Volunteer Attorney Program’s pro bono clinics, 2024 officers of the Asian American Bar Association of Houston and how to donate during the final days of a campaign that supports civil pro bono legal services in Dallas.

Q&A: Rachel Morgan of Nexstar

For Premium Subscribers She’s handled pro bono cases for the Dallas Volunteer Attorney Program for 20 years. She sits on the board of a very large foundation. She’s led a

Rachel Morgan: Pro Bono ‘Should Be the Highest Priority Work that We Do’

She’s handled pro bono cases for the Dallas Volunteer Attorneys Program for 20 years. She sits on the board of a very large foundation. She’s led a series of successful fundraisers, her most recent a record-breaking $1.3 million. She’s helping kids afford college at her alma mater. She saved a rescue dog named Ricky Bobby who does not have chemical burns, but does have bad skin.

Oh yeah, and her day job is general counsel of the country’s largest television station owner. But Nexstar Media Group’s Rachel Morgan has traveled down a long path to get to where she is today, hustling every step of the way.

For all of her achievements, The Texas Lawbook and the Association of Corporate Counsel’s Dallas-Fort Worth chapter have named Morgan the recipient of the 2023 DFW Corporate Counsel Award for Achievement in Pro Bono and Public Service.

Here is her full story.

Judge Higginbotham Drills Down on ‘Impermissible Gloss’ of Court’s ‘Moment of Threat Doctrine’ in Qualified Immunity Case

Judge Patrick E. Higginbotham authored the panel opinion and a concurrence, saying the court was bound to follow its own precedent in this case while also calling on the Fifth Circuit or the U.S. Supreme Court to “revisit the doctrine” that is “deployed daily across this country” in police shooting cases. The case involves the shooting death of Ashtian Barnes, who was stopped for having outstanding toll violations — a non-arrestable offense — and was killed by Officer Roberto Felix Jr. when he attempted to drive away.

Pioneer’s Akshar Patel Counseling the Board on the Biggest M&A Deal of 2023

Akshar Patel has always been a prodigy, graduating summa cum laude at 19 and law school at 21, where he was an editor at SMU Dedman School of Law’s International Law Journal. He had four years of corporate law practice on his resume and was associate general counsel at Flowserve Corporation at 26. Now a ripe old 38, Patel is the corporate secretary and vice president of legal at Pioneer Natural Resources, where he played a critical role in the October 2023 $64.5 billion acquisition of Pioneer by Exxon Mobil.

“He played an instrumental role in orchestrating the largest deal signed in the entire world in 2023,” said Gibson Dunn partner Jeff Chapman. “To quote the great sage Adam Sandler, ‘Not too shabby.’”

Citing his extraordinary work on the Exxon Mobil deal, the Association of Corporate Counsel’s DFW Chapter and The Texas Lawbook are honoring Patel with the 2023 DFW Corporate Counsel Award for Corporate Secretary/Legal Counselor of the Year.

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