Citing “luck, mirrors and Southwest Airlines,” Pete Winstead started a small business transactional law firm in 1973 with Bill Sechrest and Chuck McGuire that is now a full-service law firm with more than 300 lawyers in eight offices.
A 1965 graduate of the University of Texas School of Law, Winstead died Wednesday. He was 84.
Winstead was a confidant of former President George W. Bush and Michael Dell. He spent four years with the U.S. Justice Department’s tax division, where he was sent to Selma, Alabama, to monitor civil rights protests.
Returning to Dallas, Winstead practiced law at Vial Hamilton before leaving to start the law firm that bears his name.
In an announcement issued Friday, Winstead officials said Winstead “passed away unexpectedly” on Wednesday and had been still active with the law firm.
“Pete was highly respected by his colleagues and those with whom he served in various capacities,” the firm stated. “As a founding member of the firm, Pete instilled the values of service, teamwork and excellence and held his fellow attorneys to those high standards.”
“Pete’s departure leaves a void that will be deeply felt by all who had the privilege of knowing and working with him,” Winstead CEO Jeff Matthews said in a statement. “His unwavering commitment to excellence, integrity, and justice was the cornerstone of our firm and his legacy will continue to guide us. We extend our heartfelt condolences to his family, friends, and all touched by his remarkable life.”
In 1987, Winstead moved to Austin to launch the firm’s office in the Texas capital.
In a 2014 interview with then-Law360 reporter Jeremy Heallen, Winstead said that he developed a close relationship with leaders at PricewaterhouseCoopers and then computer whiz kid Michael Dell and worked on Dell’s initial public offering in 1988.
“We hitched our star to [Dell] and convinced him that to go public, he had to do that with a Dallas transactional firm,” Winstead told Heallen.