Free Speech, Due Process and Trial by Jury
Mattress Firm senior counsel Mindy Harper had been on the job only a few months when the Houston bedding company became embroiled in a multi-year, bet-the-company dispute that was litigating in 14 states - all happening as Mattress Firm went through a $3 billion bankruptcy and restructuring. “Mindy was the quintessential ‘grace under fire’ since the date she started at the company,” Houston lawyer John Thomas said.
Daria Russell is the granddaughter of sharecroppers. She worked hard, went to Harvard Law and worked at a global law firm. Now she is senior counsel at Mattress Firm where she has handled more than a dozen M&A deals and guided the retailer through bankruptcy restructuring. She is also the 2020 Houston Corporate Counsel's Senior Counsel of the Year for a Small Legal Department. This is Daria Russell's story.
Includes link to special Q&A for Premium Subscribers Only, including what Russell looks for in outside counsel.
Mattress Firm GC Kindel Nuno does not mince words about December 2017: “It was horrible – among the worst days of my professional career." Nuno had led MF through two-dozen M&A deals to make it a national bedding retailer with 3,600 stores and $3 billion in revenues. But then, Mattress Firm's parent company was accused of accounting fraud and the Houston retailer was staring at bankruptcy. Thankfully, MF had Nuno as its legal guide.
Includes link to special Q&A for Premium Subscribers Only.Corporate in-house counsel from companies including Flowserve, NexTier, Pinnacle Propane and Seabed Geosolutions are among the recipients of the 2020 Magna Stella Awards.
International corporate mergers often hinge on the meaning of a single term or the interpretation of a response. Enter Energy Transfer senior counsel Jing Bian, a Chinese-born, Harvard Law-educated M&A lawyer used her knowledge of Chinese culture and fluency in Mandarin to help guide the pipeline giant through a crucial joint venture. Citing Bian’s extraordinary success in less than two years in-house, Jing Bian is the 2020 Houston Corporate Counsel Awards Rookie of the Year.
Veronica Foley was five when her grandfather, a lawyer in Columbia, was assassinated for being a political activist. The family lived in constant fear. She took different routes to school daily. Nearly four decades later, Foley is the general counsel at Precision Drilling. She and lawyers at Norton Rose Fulbright last year won a heated 8-year FLSA battle that could have been devastating for the Houston company. Foley and the law firm are the recipients of the 2020 Houston Corporate Counsel Business Litigation of the Year Award. The Texas Lawbook has the exclusive inside story.
Leanne Oliver could write the ultimate guide to girls about growing up. She lived in hippie communes, an old blue-green school bus, in the woods of North Idaho, in a 100-year-old log cabin and then back on the old school bus. That was just in elementary school. Today, Oliver is the GC of PepsiCo Foods North America and one of the most influential voices in the Texas corporate law community. She has a story to tell and she tells it to The Texas Lawbook.
While the rest of us have been dodging disaster, Jared Sine has been having a very, very good year. After settling with Bumble, the chief legal officer for Match helped guide the company through a reverse-split from Barry Diller’s IAC. Even in the best of times, it’s a complicated transaction that requires intense attention, a firm sense of direction and lots of luck. But add to that an economic collapse and a global pandemic and you ... well, Sine explains what it took to The Texas Lawbook.
Fresh out of bankruptcy, Dallas-based Eco-Bat Technologies has hired former Stream Energy general counsel and Baker Botts special counsel Daniel Terrell as the company’s first chief legal officer.
The Texas Access to Justice Commission has presented its 2020 Corporate Counsel Pro Bono Award to Toyota Managing Counsel Scott Young. Texas Supreme Court Justice Eva Guzman said Young "has an unwavering commitment to pro bono work."
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