Kathryn Hand’s first job out of college in 2013 was, in her words, “not-so-great — it felt mindless to me. I knew I needed a career that was going to be challenging,” she told The Texas Lawbook.
In the dozen years since, Hand obtained her law degree, spent five years getting trial experience and has spent the past two years scoring litigation achievements as senior counsel for litigation at Canada-based midstream energy giant Enbridge, including winning a case at the Ohio Supreme Court in which hundreds of millions of dollars were at stake. Citing her remarkable achievements in such a short time, the Association of Corporate Counsel’s Houston Chapter and The Texas Lawbook have named Hand as one of two finalists for the 2025 Houston Corporate Counsel Award for Rookie of the Year.
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In this Q&A with The Texas Lawbook, Kathryn Hand discusses the traits she seeks in outside counsel, what outside counsel need to know when working with her and more.
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In this edition of Litigation Roundup, a Dallas law firm gets another favorable verdict in a mesothelioma trial against Johnson & Johnson, a federal judge in McAllen hands out prison sentences for participants in a $110 million kickback scheme, and the Texas Supreme Court clarifies the limitations of a state law that prohibits the unlawful solicitation of legal clients.
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Victoria Salem left her liquified natural gas law practice at Latham & Watkins in London in June 2015 to join the corporate legal department at Occidental Petroleum handling major transactions. Today, Salem joins a growing number of in-house lawyers rejoining law firms by becoming the newest partner in the Houston office of the Magic Circle firm Clifford Chance.
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Chevron Phillips Assistant GC Cheryl-Lynne Davis and Baker Botts associate Teresa Jones — both women of color and lawyers who specialize in environmental law — shared Thanksgiving dinner in 2023. Over turkey and all the fixings, Davis and Jones discussed professional struggles they faced and together started working on a solution that now benefits some of the largest corporations in South Texas.
“What started as a casual conversation quickly became a shared mission: to create space for people like us to build community, exchange knowledge and uplift one another,” Jones said.
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The week ending May 10 was, to say the least, brisk. Depending on how you count, there were 21 transactions valued at $21.5 billion or 24 valued at just over $30 billion. Either way, that’s pretty fair traffic compared to last week’s 11 deals for $4.2 billion. But it seems in keeping with last year’s 22 deals for $14 billion at about this time. Maybe deals just wanted to close themselves for Mothers’ Day.
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Texas Reaches $1.375B Settlement with Google in Data Privacy Suits
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