Brenda Sapino Jeffreys

March 17, 2011 | Legaltech News

Houston attorney Richard Merrill got caught up in a real estate scam involving an e-mail to a Houston realtor from a bogus client in London, and a fake check for $500,000. Merrill isn't the only one in Texas dealing with fraudsters: two law firms were victims of name-napping. "I need to alert other attorneys that [scammers] are getting more sophisticated," says Merrill.

By Brenda Sapino Jeffreys

6 minute read

August 19, 2005 | Texas Lawyer

The U.S. government will keep $2.7 million in lottery winnings it seized from a convicted drug trafficker, and the dealer will serve a 292-month sentence in federal prison on a drug trafficking conviction, the 5th Circuit ruled.

By Brenda Sapino Jeffreys

2 minute read

April 12, 2006 | Texas Lawyer

Former Enron Corp. Chief Executive Officer Jeffrey Skilling, testifying for the second day at his criminal trial, said on April 11 that he and co-defendant Kenneth Lay, Enron's one-time chairman, never conspired together or with others to defraud investors by presenting false and misleading financial statements.

By Brenda Sapino Jeffreys

8 minute read

October 24, 2005 | Texas Lawyer

The five former Enron Broadband Services (EBS) defendants who went to trial together this year in the so-called Enron Broadband trial won't all sit at the same defense table next year during a retrial. On Sept. 12, U.S. District Judge Vanessa Gilmore of Houston set three separate trial dates for the defendants. Kevin Howard, former vice president of finance at EBS, and Michael Krautz, former senior director of transactional accounting, will go to trial in May; Scott Yeager, former senior vice president of s

By Brenda Sapino Jeffreys

2 minute read

January 25, 2010 | Texas Lawyer

An Ohio man who accepted an approximately $100,000 settlement for his Vioxx personal-injury claim has filed a negligence suit against three Houston firms and three Houston lawyers, alleging the defendants made paperwork errors in his case file that reduced the size of his settlement. The plaintiff said that he should have received a settlement totaling more than $436,000.

By Brenda Sapino Jeffreys

4 minute read

January 31, 2005 | Texas Lawyer

When an Austin firm sued a former client -- who is an attorney -- for alleged nonpayment of fees for representing the client in a lengthy arbitration proceeding, the firm may have gotten more than it bargained for. On Jan. 24, Melissa Hamilton sued Richard �Rick� Harrison, Daniel Byrne and Thomas Fritz, partners in Fritz, Byrne, Head & Harrison (FBHH), which had sued Hamilton to collect a debt that the firm alleges she owes.

By Brenda Sapino Jeffreys

13 minute read

February 14, 2001 | Law.com

When Jack Pierce retired at the end of 2000 after 37 years as a state district judge in East Texas, he was looking forward to sitting as a visiting judge and doing mediations at his new office in downtown Nacogdoches. But six weeks into 2001, Pierce is trying to get over an illness -- arsenic poisoning -- and Texas Rangers and agents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation are investigating whether there was foul play involved.

By Brenda Sapino Jeffreys

3 minute read

February 16, 2005 | Law.com

Rekindling a hot topic in the bankruptcy bar, Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, filed a bill Feb. 8 that would require corporations to file for bankruptcy where their principal place of business or their principal assets are located. It would prevent a corporation from filing for bankruptcy in a location that's simply the home of a subsidiary, or the state where it is incorporated. Cornyn says the Fairness in Bankruptcy Litigation Act of 2005 would prevent forum-shopping.

By Brenda Sapino Jeffreys

8 minute read

August 02, 2007 | The Legal Intelligencer

Dallas-based Winstead, one of the largest firms in Texas, will not raise associate salaries in the wake of Texas market moves kicked off by a new salary scale effective today at Houston-based Vinson & Elkins.

By Brenda Sapino Jeffreys

4 minute read

July 02, 2007 | Texas Lawyer

Warren Todd Hoeffner, a partner in Houston plaintiffs firm Hoeffner & Bilek, was named in a federal indictment that alleges he paid more than $3 million in "bribes and kickbacks" to two former claims adjustors for The Hartford Insurance Co. in connection with $34 million in settlements of Hoeffner's silica-related suits. Hoeffner, 42, pleaded not guilty to the charges at an arraignment on June 27.

By Brenda Sapino Jeffreys

6 minute read