2011: David Jones leaves Houston law firm Porter Hedges after 19 years as a corporate bankruptcy lawyer to become a bankruptcy judge in the Southern District of Texas. Jones later hires Porter Hedges bankruptcy associate Elizabeth Freeman as his law clerk.
2012: Jones and Freeman each file for divorce.
2015: Jones is selected chief bankruptcy judge for the SDTX.
2016: Jones begins implementing a series of substantive reforms to create a special two-judge panel in the SDTX to handle the biggest and most complicated corporate restructurings, to provide parties increased access to court officials and to make procedures more transparent and predictable. The idea is to create a structure to convince larger businesses to file their complex bankruptcies and restructuring in Texas instead of New York or Delaware.
2018: Freeman leaves the employ of Jones and the SDTX to join Jackson Walker as a lawyer in its bankruptcy practice. She is promoted to equity partner Jan. 1, 2021.
2018: Kirkland & Ellis, widely regarded as the nation’s leading corporate bankruptcy law firm, chooses Dallas-based Jackson Walker to be its primary local counsel in more than 40 large business bankruptcies filed in Texas.
March 2020: The Covid-19 pandemic hits. Stay-at-home orders are implemented. Business revenues plummet. Oil and gas prices collapse. Scores of large businesses, including Neiman Marcus, J.C. Penney Company and CEC Entertainment (parent company of Chuck E. Cheese), file for bankruptcy protection in Houston. The Texas Lawbook publishes an article crediting Jones with saving the business bankruptcy law practice in Texas.
March 6, 2021: Jackson Walker receives a tip that Freeman is in a romantic relationship with Jones. Freeman confirms prior relationship with Jones but denies a current relationship.
March 8, 2021: Jackson Walker informs Jones of the allegation.
Feb. 1, 2022: A Jackson Walker partner learns that the Jones-Freeman relationship is ongoing.
March 29, 2022: A Jackson Walker partner confronts Freeman, who admits the relationship is active.
December 2022: Freeman leaves Jackson Walker to start her own law firm.
Oct. 4, 2023: Michael Van Deelen, a shareholder who lost everything in the McDermott International bankruptcy handled by Jones, files a federal fraud and breach of fiduciary duties lawsuit accusing Jones and Freeman of being involved in a secret romantic relationship. Jackson Walker and Kirkland & Ellis are subsequently added as defendants in the conspiracy allegation.
Oct. 5, 2023: In an interview with The Texas Lawbook, Jones acknowledges the relationship with Freeman, saying he kept it private because he “thought it was no one’s business.” He also claims the relationship had no impact on any official decisions he made.
Oct. 13, 2023: Fifth Circuit Chief Judge Priscilla Richman announces the court was conducting an ethics probe into allegations against Jones, stating that he “ran roughshod over several canons of the Code of Conduct for U.S. Judges.”
Oct. 15, 2023: Jones resigns.
Nov. 3, 2023: U.S. Trustee announces 26 bankruptcy cases tainted by Jones’ relationship with Freeman. That number has now grown to 33 cases. The Trustee states it may demand Freeman’s old law firm, Jackson Walker, pay back millions of dollars it was paid in legal fees in those cases.
Nov. 13, 2023: Jackson Walker claims Freeman misled the firm about her relationship with Jones.
March 4, 2024: U.S. Trustee files official documents seeking to claw back at least $18 million in legal fees paid to Jackson Walker, claiming the firm acted in “bad faith.”
March 8, 2024: Jackson Walker claims there that there is zero evidence that any bankruptcy decisions were impacted by Jones’s relationship with Freeman.
March 24, 2024: Jackson Walker files in court an internal firm memo from 2021 showing that Freeman lied to firm leaders about her relationship with Jones.
July 11, 2024: Jones files a motion to dismiss, claiming he had judicial immunity for all his official acts and duties.
July 18, 2024: SDTX Chief Judge Eduardo Rodriguez swears in former Weil Gotshal partner Alfredo Perez as Houston’s newest bankruptcy judge, replacing Jones.
Aug. 15, 2024: Two investment firms, Fidelity and Apollo Global Management, file documents in the Sanchez Energy bankruptcy claiming they would not have accepted a 2020 settlement agreement pushed by Jones, who mediated the dispute in which Freeman was a lawyer for Sanchez, which is now called Mesquite Energy. The two lenders say the settlement agreement cost them hundreds of millions of dollars, and they want to participate in the claw back of fees against Jackson Walker.
Aug. 16, 2024: Western District of Texas Chief District Judge Alia Moses dismisses lawsuit brought by Van Deelen, ruling that he does not have legal standing to bring the lawsuit. But she described the conduct of Jones, Freeman and Jackson Walker as “egregious.” The judge states that, “Litigants should not have to wonder whether the judge overseeing their case stands to gain from ruling against them: but in Jones’s courtroom, they did.”
Sept. 20, 2024: SDTX Bankruptcy Judge Marvin Isgur, stating that Jackson Walker “breached its own ethical duties” and “defiled the very temple of justice” when it hid the romantic relationship between Jones and Freeman, refers the matter to SDTX Chief Judge Randy Crane for possible disciplinary proceedings against Jackson Walker lawyers. Chief Judge Crane assigns the disciplinary inquiry to U.S. District judge Lee Rosenthal of Houston. In a five-page memo, Isgur states that Jackson Walker partners knew about Freeman’s relationship with Jones in 2021 but made no disclosures to its clients or opposing counsel as required.
Sept. 24, 2024: Kirkland files its first Chapter 11 for a debtor in the SDTX since Judge Jones’ resignation, but uses Bracewell — not Jackson Walker — as local counsel in the Vertex Energy bankruptcy.
Oct. 11, 2024: SDTX complex bankruptcy case manager Albert Alonzo, who worked for Jones for nearly a decade, tells the U.S. Trustee during a deposition that he knew about the Jones-Freeman relationship before it became public in October 2023.
Dec. 16, 2024: The U.S. Trustee’s case seeking to claw back of legal fees against Jackson Walker is scheduled to start trial.
Jan. 10: Bloomberg Law reports that Kirkland partner Joshua Sussberg testified in a deposition that he was “absolutely shocked” when he learned in October 2023 about the undisclosed romance and cohabitation between Judge Jones and former Jackson Walker partner Elizabeth Freeman.
Jan. 30: J.C. Penney filed a lawsuit to claw-back $1.1 million in legal fees it paid Jackson Walker in its 2020 bankruptcy restructuring.
Feb.3: U.S. District Judge Lee Rosenthal of Houston, in a three-page order, recommended closing the federal court disciplinary complaint against Jackson Walker filed by Bankruptcy Judge Isgur on Sept. 20. “There is no risk that Jackson Walker and some of its lawyers will escape scrutiny and potential punishment for the failure to disclose that led to this complaint in the first place,” Judge Rosenthal wrote.
April 4: Jackson Walker reached an agreement with former client Basic Energy Services to settled its dispute over the failed disclosure of the relationship between former partner Elizabeth Freeman and judge Jones. Jackson Walker agreed to repay $783,000 of the $1.54 million Basic Energy paid the firm as a legal advisor in its bankruptcy. The money went to the U.S. Trustee and those funds will be distributed to creditors under the court-approved approved bankruptcy liquidation plan.
April 8: Jackson Walker reached a settlement with former client 4E Brands, agreeing to pay back $617,000 of the $866,726 the firm had been paid to handle as legal advisor on its bankruptcy.
April 10: Chief U.S. District Judge for the Western District of Texas, Alia Moses, granted a request by the U.S. Trustee to reclaim control over the 34 bankruptcy cases in which the U.S. Trustee is seeking to claw back millions in fees awarded to Jackson Walker. The seven-page order moved the cases out of the courtroom of Chief U.S. Bankruptcy Judge for the Southern District of Texas, Eduardo V. Rodriguez.
May 12: U.S. Trustee files motion to consolidate 33 of the bankruptcy cases involving Jackson Walker into one matter before Chief Judge Moses.
May 30: Jackson Walker agrees to mediate the dispute with the U.S. Trustee over 33 cases.
June 12: A group of disgruntled GWG Holdings bondholders allege in a 138-page lawsuit that Jones, Freeman, The Law Office of Liz Freeman, Jackson Walker and Porter Hedges were actually players in a racketeering conspiracy, “work[ing] together to prey upon distressed entities for their own financial gain.”
Source: Texas Lawbook research, SDTX court records