David Snively, general counsel of Monsanto. Courtesy photo

Monsanto Co.'s general counsel, David Snively, has officially retired.

He's left behind a legal department with a new corporate owner now grappling with a $289 million public relations black eye—a high-profile jury verdict in a case alleging that Roundup weed killer causes cancer. 

Snively walked off into the sunset earlier this summer on the heels of German pharmaceutical company Bayer's $66 billion acquisition of Monsanto, according to a spokeswoman for the agribusiness giant. 

The ink was barely dry on the Bayer deal when a federal jury in San Francisco awarded nearly $290 million on Aug. 10 to a former school groundskeeper who argued that he got cancer from using Monsanto's Roundup herbicide.  

Now, as Bayer searches for Snively's successor, the company suddenly finds itself thrust into a public relations crisis while dealing with a recent dramatic drop in its stock price and a potential flood of Roundup lawsuits. 

If he were still seated at his desk inside Monsanto's headquarters, Snively would likely be in his element. After a stint as a trial lawyer at Indianapolis-based Barnes & Thornburg, he joined Monsanto in the 1980s, while it was being sued for making Agent Orange, an herbicide used during the Vietnam War.

He went on to help navigate the company over more rough terrain, including litigation over genetically modified wheat contamination claims and, most recently, its merger with Bayer. He was paid more than $3.5 million in 2017, according to a filing from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

Snively, a graduate of the Indiana University Robert H. McKinney School of Law, acknowledged in a 2016 interview that Monsanto was a “controversial company” and its legal department could be a pressure cooker. 

“We're going to be on the front pages of papers all the time,” he said previously. “So, if you can't really stand that heat, and you're not committed to making a difference and being passionate, then you shouldn't be here.”

Last year, he said general counsel “to a large degree, are certainly risk managers” and are often “the executive that gets looked to if there is a challenge that comes at you quickly, because the thought process of lawyers is to problem-solve and act very quickly.”

Monsanto's vice president of global strategy, Scott Partridge, said in an interview with Corporate Counsel that he and Snively “grew up together” in the company's legal department. Partridge was promoted to chief deputy counsel on the same day that Snively became GC. Partridge spent another five years in that role before he transitioned to his current post.

“Dave's missed,” said Partridge, who described Snively as a ”constant figure and presence … for a long, long time.” He added, jokingly, that Snively, a marathoner, was probably running along a beach somewhere.